This guest post is by Jim Pugel, interim chief of the Seattle Police Department.

As a law enforcement professional for more than 30 years, I’ve worked with hundreds of other officers in keeping our communities safe. The courts have stated that police have a "community care-taking" function. Syringe exchange programs are one of the ways we have of promoting public health and safety, but Congress has undermined these essential programs by prohibiting use of federal funds to support them.

Last week I spent two days in Washington, DC, with representatives from amfAR, the Foundation for AIDS Research, meeting with senators and representatives and participating in a Capitol Hill briefing of staffers regarding lifting the federal ban on syringe exchange programs. As it considers the 2014 budget, Congress urgently needs to reverse this counterproductive restriction and permit federal funding for these programs.

Washington State began America’s first syringe exchange program in 1984, and, at the time, many feared it might undermine safe communities and law enforcement by encouraging drug use. After nearly three decades of study, it is clear that syringe programs help prevent HIV and other blood-borne pathogen transmission without increasing drug use, and reduce needle-sticks to police.

With 20 syringe programs around the state, Washington is a national leader in reducing the harms associated with drug use. In 2011 alone, syringe programs across Washington exchanged more than 11 million used syringes for sterile equipment—more than triple the number for any other state. Because of the availability of syringe exchange, communities in our states are healthier and safer.

Given the surge in prescription drug use and the associated increase in the number of people who turn to injecting drugs, demand for syringe exchange has grown. In Washington, the number of syringes exchanged has more than doubled since 2007.

With clear evidence documenting the benefits of syringe exchange, President Obama signed legislation in 2009 lifting the 20-year-old federal funding ban. In 2011, though, Congress restored the ban.

Syringe programs across the country are a large part of why we have seen a steep decline in annual new HIV infections from drug use since the 1980s. But, public health problems associated with drug use persist. From 2007-2010, injection drug use accounted for one in 12 new HIV infections in the US. Drug use is the leading cause of new cases of hepatitis C, a life-threatening condition that affects nearly three times as many people as HIV.

As numerous studies in the US and abroad have confirmed, syringe programs steer individuals toward effective drug treatment. Syringe exchange helps stabilize lives. Clients receive counseling and support; in one study of syringe programs in the U.S., employment among clients increased 45 percent within six months of enrollment.

Syringe programs, which actively encourage clients to return used needles, make communities safer by reducing the number of discarded needles, decreasing the likelihood that children or others will encounter contaminated injecting equipment in public places.

The public safety benefit of syringe programs is of particular importance to police officers and medical first responders, who are likely to suffer needle-stick injuries during regular duties. In one study of police officers in San Diego, 30 percent reported having been stuck by a needle at least once. Having well-supported syringe programs increases the likelihood that drug users will tell officers that they possess injecting equipment, reducing odds that an officer will incur a needle-stick injury during a search.

In the context of the federal budget, the dollar amounts at issue in the syringe exchange ban are minuscule. During the two years when federal funding was available, Washington allocated $79,500 in federal funding to support syringe exchange programs around the state. Although a modest sum, the loss of this flexibility has had severe consequences. Several programs have limited hours, reduced services and cut staff.

By restoring the ban on federal funding for syringe exchange, members of Congress undoubtedly believed they were striking a blow against drug use. As experience has shown, nothing could be further from truth. By withholding funding for syringe exchange, Congress has made our communities, police officers and medical responders less safe, undermined a vital bridge to drug treatment, and hindered national efforts to address serious public health problems such as HIV and hepatitis C.

When the White House released the budget proposal for 2014, it included language that would allow local and state policy makers to determine for themselves whether to use federal funds for evidence-based syringe services programs. The bill containing the clearest language that would allow local jurisdictions to use existing federal money for syringe exchange programs is the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, and Related Agencies Appropriation Bill, 2014. Now we are waiting to see if Congress will adopt the Senate language and make it possible again for jurisdictions to make their own decisions about use of federal funds for this evidence based programming.