New Study: Some Crimes Increased, Others Decreased Around Toronto Supervised Consumption Sites

(MENAFN- The Conversation) There have been more than 53,000 opioid-related deaths across Canada since 2016. As part of public health efforts to reduce these deaths, many cities offer overdose prevention and supervised consumption sites.

These centres allow people who use illegal drugs to do so under the supervision of a person trained to reverse opioid poisonings. They also offer clean drug use equipment, safe disposal of used equipment and take-home naloxone, a drug that can reverse the effects of opioid overdose.

Between 2020 and 2025, 48 overdose prevention and supervised consumption sites operated in Canada. While studies show they can reduce mortality and health service use for people who use drugs, they are controversial.

People opposed to these sites worry they increase local crime and disorder by attracting drug-related activity like theft, assault, open drug use and hazardous discarded equipment. In Toronto, opposition to the sites increased after a woman was killed near one in east-end Toronto in 2023. The facility later closed after the Ontario government mandated sites within 200 metres of schools or daycare be shuttered.

Recently, our team at McGill University published a study looking at the association between these sites and crime near nine Toronto locations.

For this study, we used publicly available data from the Toronto Police Service and looked at the five major crime indicators (assault, break and enters, auto theft, robbery and theft over $5,000), as well as thefts from motor vehicles and bicycle thefts. These geo-coded data included all incidents reported at the offence or victim level.

What we found

We looked at the number of crimes within 400 metres of a site in the three years after they were opened, and compared that with the number of crimes expected for each neighbourhood had the sites not begun operating. To determine that figure, we accounted for the trends in crime occurring in each neighbourhood in the three years before the sites opened.

In other words, we looked for changes in crime trends as well as crime spikes immediately after sites were opened. We reported our findings for each site, and summarized results across all nine sites.

The results were mixed. The sites were not consistently associated with changes in local crime.

Summarizing the situation at all sites, we found they were associated with a 50 per cent increase in break and enters, and it would take approximately 34 months to return to levels normally expected around the sites. Meanwhile, monthly trends in robbery, theft over $5,000 and bicycle theft declined after sites were implemented.

There were also site-specific associations. Assaults rose about one per cent faster than expected per month near the South Riverdale and St. Stephen's sites. While that may seem like a modest increase, after three years, assaults were approximately 43 per cent higher than expected in these neighbourhoods. At the same time, the Regent Park site was associated with declines in assault, robbery and bicycle theft trends.

More research needed

While our study provides more insight into how overdose and supervised consumption sites impact their surrounding areas, it also has its limitations. We cannot explain why crime increased near some sites but declined at others. We couldn't look at changes in open drug use, discarded equipment or mental health act apprehensions because of data availability and quality issues or a lack of geo-co-ordinates.

Nevertheless, our results match what other researchers have found when looking at the associations between sites and crime. In the United States, a 2021 study found that reports of assault, burglary, larceny theft and robbery decreased in the area near one site.

In New York, some researchers have found overdose prevention sites did not cause significant increases in crimes. Other research, however, did find that there was an increase in property crimes near a supervised consumption site.

Here in Canada, recently published research found that there was not a significant change in the rate of fatal shootings and stabbings near supervised consumption sites in Toronto.

Our findings also corroborate what people have observed locally – crime can increase following the opening of overdose prevention or supervised consumption sites. But it doesn't always.

Instead, the relationship between these sites and crime is complicated. Further research needs to focus on understanding why crime declined in some neighbourhoods but increased in others. These distinctions can help policymakers and public health service providers understand what works, where and why. This is crucial if we are to continue to work with communities.

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