Fort William First Nation declares state of emergency over drug epidemic [Video]

Fort William First Nation in northwestern Ontario has declared a state of emergency as the community struggles with an ongoing drug epidemic.

The state of emergency was announced Friday by Chief Michele Solomon and formally passed by council on Monday.

“This decision was made after a lot of consideration of the escalating situation that has been happening in our community related to opioid drugs,” Solomon said in a Facebook livestream informing the community of the state of emergency. “We want to assure the community that we have seen the posts on social media expressing the concerns that the community has.

“We want to assure the community that we’ve heard the messages that you’ve sent to us and that we take those to heart and we take those very seriously. We want to assure the community that we’re going to take whatever measures are necessary to try and bring a safer …