The nonprofit Safehouse is in settlement talks with the U.S. Justice Department, signaling major progress in the group’s years-long effort to open a supervised injection site in Philadelphia.

“We twice agreed to an extension of DOJ’s deadline to respond to our complaint because of productive conversations,” said Safehouse vice president Ronda Goldfein, referring to its ongoing litigation in U.S. District Court. The Biden administration originally owed Safehouse a response to its complaint in November. That was pushed back to January and is now due in March.

In its complaint, filed in September, Safehouse asked the court once again to rule that opening a space where people could inject illegal opioids under medical supervision to prevent overdoses would not be prohibited by the so-called “crackhouse statute,” a section of the U.S. Controlled Substances Act that bars any place from operating with the sole purpose of using or selling drugs. Safehouse filed the complaint after a three-judge federal appellate panel ruled that Safehouse’s proposed activities did violate federal law, reversing a previous district court decision. Safehouse asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case, but that request was denied and the matter returned to the district court.

A lot has changed since the last time Safehouse faced off against the federal government at the district court level, most importantly, the administration in Washington. A Trump appointee, former U.S. Attorney William McSwain, now a Republican candidate for Pennsylvania governor, aggressively pursued the case the first time around, suing Safehouse before it had a chance to open and appealing the lower court’s decision.

Now though, the Justice Department under Attorney General Merrick Garland has shown signs of being amenable to the sites. Safehouse has been engaged in talks with the Biden administration since September. On Monday, the DOJ told the Associated Press that it was evaluating the sites. The comments came after a scheduled “status update” call listed on the court docket

https://www.phillytrib.com/news/local_news/safehouse-is-in-settlement-talks-with-the-u-s-department-of-justice/article_f8ad38f3-26ae-5ed1-9b9a-5bcb4257528f.html