Cape Breton region's draft policy eyes end to culture of heavy drinking

Archdeacon Brenda Drake chuckles when she describes what has become a traditional send-off for the dead in the Cape Breton community she has ministered to for the last dozen years.

Funeral after funeral, the Anglican church leader says she haswatched mourners tuck miniature bottles of booze, pints and evencases of beer into caskets in plain sight.

"I would love to know how much liquor is buried in Cape Bretonbecause almost everybody goes with a bottle!" she said with alaugh, adding that she often receives bottles and liquor store giftcards from congregants.

"They may do that in other places, but they don't do it right infront of the minister....It's just so acceptable that it's becomenormal. We don't even realize that the rest of the world isn't thesame as us."

The story highlights a problem that has troubled the small islandfor decades. Now municipal politicians, police and health-careworkers are trying a unique strategy aimed at curbing a culture ofheavy drinking that has yielded the inglorious catchphrase, "CapeBreton drunk."

Samantha Hodder, a mental health and addictions specialist withthe Nova Scotia Health Authority, was involved in a study into alcoholconsumption in Cape Breton and has drafted a municipal alcoholpolicy that is expected to be adopted by council next month.

Challenging culture of heavy drinking

Hodder wants to change the acceptance of heavy drinking withpolicies that would designate some municipal facilities and eventsas alcohol-free, prohibit alcohol ads at family oriented events, notallow alcohol companies to have naming rights to municipalfacilities.

She says the policy, if accepted, would beef up the enforcementof existing liquor licensing regulations that forbid drinking in unlicenced areas such asdressing rooms, baseball fields and parks on municipalland.

Overall, she says the messaging around alcohol needs a wholesalechange in Cape Breton, which has some of the highest rates of heavydrinking in the country.

"We do not need to be exposing our children to these sorts ofalcohol-related ads," she said. "We know that that plays a
significant role in the emergence of the culture around alcohol."

The stats seem to bear out the suggestion that people drink moreheavily in Cape Breton and start drinking earlier, at around agenine.

'Perfect storm' of factors

Over half the population of people aged 20 to 34 in Cape Bretonsaid they drank heavily in one month, compared to the nationalaverage of 34 per cent, according to Statistics Canada in 2013.

A provincial drug use survey in 2012 also revealed thedistressing case of a seven-year-old drinking a beer outside his
post office. One paramedic reported bringing in highly intoxicated12 year olds after finding them unconscious in ditches.

When asked why the small population has such high rates ofexcessive drinking, Hodder cites a bleak mix of chronic
unemployment, outmigration and boredom that can lead to increasedcrime, depression and family breakdowns.

"You look at the determinants of health and it's a perfect stormhere," she says. "One in three children in Cape Breton are growingup in poverty compared to one in five in Nova Scotia. All of thosethings are contributing factors."

Cape Breton Regional Police Chief Peter McIsaac, who contributed tothemunicipal alcohol policy with Hodder, has seen first-hand thedamaging effects of alcoholism and the normalizationof excessivedrinking.

In one year he reviewed 100 police calls and found that 70 ofthem had some connection to alcohol use, whether it be impaireddriving, domestic violence or petty crimes.

Socially acceptable in wrong way

"I've seen so many family breakups and so many women assaultedwhere alcohol was a huge factor and I've seen so many childrenaffected by it," said the 30-year police force veteran.

"At 13 years of age, youth in Nova Scotia and maybe younger inCape Breton are being exposed to alcohol and this is becomingsocially acceptable behaviour and it's wrong."

John, a recovering alcoholic who didn't want to use his fullname, knows well the draw of his hometown's permissive attitude whenit comes to alcohol.

Living in Ontario and Alberta years ago, he would survey the barat the end of the night and find almost all of the patrons werefamiliar faces from the East Coast.

Still, he says he returned to Glace Bay because "drinking athome was a lot easier. It was more accepted."

"Why is that? It's our culture drink, drink, drink," says the65-year-old former miner who's been sober for two decades. "There'sa saying in Cape Breton 'You got to get right out of her, boy.'That's not normal.

"I got the Cape Breton right in me."