NORTHAMPTON — Tapestry Health Inc. is severing ties with the state Department of Public Health with regard to its needle exchange service in Holyoke as of July 1 and plans to distribute free needles to the public without the agency’s support — as long as a judge approves.
Lawyers for the Florence-based nonprofit filed a motion in Hampden Superior Court on May 12 requesting Judge Mark Mason vacate or modify his March ruling that ordered Tapestry to stop distributing hypodermic syringes and needles at its Holyoke clinic within 120 days. The decision provided a window for the council to vote on approving or ending the service, though it has taken no action on the matter to date.
At the time, Mason ruled that the agency did not receive proper approval from the City Council when it opened the program in 2012 under the state’s “pilot needle exchange program,” which is overseen and funded by the state Department of Public Health. The matter went to court after Holyoke city councilors filed a lawsuit over the clinic’s opening in 2012.
“We see this as a good path forward that complies with his (Mason’s) order and allows us to keep providing services that are vitally needed,” Cheryl Zoll, Tapestry’s CEO said of the latest legal development in the case.
Tapestry operates needle exchange programs in Northampton and Holyoke. They are among six needle exchange clinics created in the wake of a 1993 state law, which authorized the state Department of Public Health to permit up to 10 needle exchange pilot programs in Massachusetts. The law states that such programs require “local approval,” and councilors who brought the complaint believe that should have included the city’s legislative body.
When Tapestry opened its needle exchange clinic in 2012, it received unanimous approval by the Board of Health and support from the mayor and police chief, but the council was not involved, as was the case in Northampton when a needle exchange clinic opened in that city 17 years earlier. Tapestry Health, Holyoke Mayor Alex Morse and that city’s health officials are named as defendants in the case.
In their legal argument, Northampton lawyers William C. Newman, of the American Civil Liberties Union of Western Massachusetts, and Michael Aleo, of Lesser, Newman, Aleo & Nasser in Northampton, write that while Department of Public Health can still nominate communities for pilot needle exchange programs and fund them, state laws as amended in 2006 do not prohibit, restrict or limit the possession or non-sale distribution of needles only the “sale” of needles.
“You can possess them and you can distribute them, that’s exactly what the law says,” Newman said. “What we’re saying is the law allows for the distribution of needles.”
Newman and Aleo cite in their latest motion a December 2015 case in Barnstable Superior Court where a Judge Raymond P. Veary ruled in favor of the AIDS Support Group of Cape Cod, which faced a similar situation as Tapestry Health in Barnstable.
The court agreed with the organization’s interpretation of the law regarding hypodermic needles, which “says nothing about possessing such items and dispensing them without sale,” according to the decision.
“The request seeks legal permission to continue,” Newman said of Tapestry’s motion before Mason.
Tapestry Health was not able to provide a precise figure on the amount of money it receives from the Department of Public Health to operate its needle exchange program on Main Street in Holyoke, but Zoll said the organization will raise the money necessary to continue its needle exchange work. The court ruling in March does not affect the other health, educational and training services provided at Tapestry’s clinic in Holyoke.
“We’re committed to keeping the services going whatever that amount may be,” she said.
Staff Writer Dan Crowley can be reached at dcrowley@gazettenet.com.