Thierry Charlois

Metropolitan conference on drugs in Aubervilliers, France

On November 24th-25th, 2011, the city of Paris, the council of Seine-Saint-Denis and the French Forum for Urban Security organised a conference on "drugs and risky behaviours: which policy? which prevention?".

This conference was a follow up of a ongoing cooperation between Paris and the Seine-Saint-Denis for practice sharing on drugs, risky behaviours and drug trafficking.

In the framework of the conference, I contributed to the session on global and European drug policies.

> Read the conference report HERE

The Party+ Network

The PARTY+ Network was created by four safer nightlife Labels and Charters: Quality Nights in Belgium, Fêtez Clairs in France, Q de Festa ! in Spain and Safer Clubbing in Switzerland.

The PARTY+ network aims to improve nightlife settings through community empowerment among European cities and regions by implementing qualty Labels and Charters for nightlife venues and by enhancing existing ones.

As Fêtez Clairs project manager, I am involved in the Party+ steering committee and in expert visits proposed to cities and regions.

Supporting the integration of the AFR at the EU level

The French harm reduction association (AFR) is a national umbrella gathering individuals as well as organisations in order to advocate towards the French institutions and to share practices among members. Since 2007, I have been involved with the AFR as a consultant and volunteer with the aim of improving their integration at the European level as well as the members' capacity to work in local partnerships.

Until now, the results of this mission are:

• the creation of the AFR working group for local and international partnerships;
  
• The integration of the AFR in the EU Civil Society Forum on Drugs;
• the participation of the AFR in the European Harm Reduction Network , in the ACCES project as well as in a Leonardo project;
• The integration of the AFR in the International Drug Policy Consortium.
  

Since October 2009, I am member of the AFR board of Directors and since October 2010, the treasurer of the organisation.

The Democracy, Cities & Drugs conference "New Challenges, New Solutions" - Vienna, Feb. 23-25, 2011

The partners of the Democracy, Cities & Drugs II project organised the New challenges, New solutions conference in Vienna on February 23^rd – 25^th 2011. This conference approached the DCD II topics that the working groups dealt with during the project, as well as the new challenges and solutions the local partnerships will have to tackle with.

This event made possible the participation of European Mayors, local elected officials, representatives of International and European Institutions as well as practitioners, researchers and experts active in the field of drug policies.

The result of this conference has been the Democracy, Cities & Drugs resolution.

As consultant, I was in charge of coordinating the conference Scientific Committee elaborating the programme.

Expert visit to the Safer Nights programme in Cyprus

On April 2011, in the framework of the NEWIP project, I was invited as consultant by the Cyprus Anti-drug Council, which leads the Cyprus safer nightlife programme called "Safer Nights", in order to support the development of their project. The activities undertaken during this 2-day visit were:

 

1. A meeting between the expert and the Safer Nights management board;
2. A training session for the outreach workers;
3. A meeting with the involved nightlife professionals.

This visit was an opportunity for the local team to share their practices with a European expertise and to join Party+, the European Network of Safer Nightlife Labels.

The Prague Declaration on the principles of effective local drug policies

The Prague Declaration is a statement of representatives of municipal governments, decision makers responsible for local and municipal drug policies, workers in the field of drug prevention, regulation, treatment, and harm reduction, and researchers in the field of drugs. It was prepared in Prague for the conference Urban Drug Policies in the Globalised World (September 30^th – October 2^nd, 2010) and it is open to be signed by anyone interested in urban, municipal and local drug policy.

I took part in the Prague conference and supported the dissemination of the Prague Declaration at the Democracy, Cities & Drugs conference in Vienna.

Consulting for EXASS Net

 

EXASS Net is a European network of partnerships between stakeholders at frontline level responding to drug problems providing experience and assistance for inter-sectoral cooperation. Initiated in 2006 by the EU Finnish presidency, this network is carried out by the Pompidou Group, Council of Europe. EXASS Net gathers the cities of Amsterdam (NL), Budapest (HU), Frankfurt (GE), Krakow (PL), the Lancashire (UK), Oslo (NO), Turku (FI), Zagreb (HR) as well as the Russian Federation, the Romanian Anti-drug agency, the Finnish Health Ministry, The UK Home Office, the networks Correlation network and Democracy, Cities & Drugs.

EXASS Net organises two plenary meetings a year in different cities during which participants share practices on a specific topic and visit local drug services. In June 2009 in Budapest, the EXASS Net members worked on Safer Nightlife.

> Read the background document on Safer Nightlife in Europe

The Amsterdam meeting in October 2009 focused on self-organised drug users' groups, drugs users' empowerment and Dutch cannabis policy.
 

> Read the background document on Drug user participation and EU cities

The Oslo meeting in June 2010 focused on Early intervention targeting youth at risk.

> Read the background document on Early intervention targeting youth at risk and EU cities

I was involved as consultant during the first 3-year phase of the project to be part of the EXASS Net steering committees, to co-animate the EXASS Net seminars and to write out background documents and Internet guides.