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(SHELBY THEVENOT / iNFOnews.ca)

Kamloops parks may not be a safe place to for drug users carrying their supply if a city councillor gets her way.

Councillor Katie Neustaeter is proposing the city ban drug use in public parks and facilities just months after the province decriminalized possession.

She presented the proposed bylaw change at a city council meeting today, March 28, aiming for the "protection and enhancement" of the community. Her proposal would ban drug use within the same bylaw as the ban on alcohol and smoking in parks.

READ MORE: No to drugs but yes to booze in Kelowna parks

As of Jan. 31, people are not to be arrested for possessing 2.5 grams or less of opioids, crack or powdered cocaine, methamphetamines or MDMA as part of the province’s three-year pilot program to battle B.C.'s opioid crisis.

The rules around that pilot project say the drugs are still not allowed “on the premises of elementary and secondary schools and licensed child-care facilities,” at airports or on Canadian Coast Guard vessels and helicopters.

Council won't vote on the proposal until the next council meeting on April 18, but Kamloops wouldn't be the first community to ban drug use in certain public areas.

Sicamous recently passed a bylaw banning drug use in its public parks and Penticton is considering a similar bylaw.

READ MORE: Sicamous leading the way in banning drug use in parks

Campbell River recently backed out of plans to introduce a similar bylaw after facing opposition from Island Health and Vancouver-based Pivot Legal Society, according to Victoria Times-Colonist.

Kelowna mayor Tom Dyas is taking a different approach by lobbying the province.

Dyas spoke to a number of provincial ministers and ministry staff when he was in Victoria a couple of weeks ago to request parks and playgrounds be added to Health Canada's regulations within the pilot project. The mayor was told other communities had been asking for the same thing. Although the people he spoke with seemed warm to the idea, it's not clear whether the province will bring that request to Health Canada.

— With files from Rob Munro.

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