STATE TO CREATE 10 DRUG-ABUSE TREATMENT CENTERS

Healing Place Will Serve As A Model

Kentucky plans to spend about $9.5million to create 10 drug- and
alcohol-abuse centers around the state, Gov. Ernie Fletcher announced
yesterday.

"We do have a substance-abuse problem," Fletcher said at The Healing Place
in Louisville, which will serve as the model for a statewide system of
recovery centers. "It is in every corner of the commonwealth."

The state hopes to serve up to 1,000 people at a time who have a drug or
alcohol problem and are seeking help but have no resources to pay for it.

The plan, called Recovery Kentucky, won't use any new funds. Rather it will
build the centers with $2.5million in federal tax credits that otherwise
would be used to finance affordable housing for the poor. The state will
use $4million in community development block grants and $3million from the
Corrections Department to operate the centers.

Fletcher acknowledged the state is redirecting some resources - the tax
credits - that would have been used to develop affordable housing. But he
said he thinks it's a good use of the money because many people with drug
and alcohol problems are homeless.

"This is the most efficient program at addressing drug addiction and
homelessness," Fletcher said.

One advocate said yesterday that the government needs to spend more rather
than reallocate existing resources for housing.

"This really doesn't address that pervasive need," said Jane Walsh,
executive director of the Metropolitan Housing Coalition in Louisville. "We
simply don't have the resources to meet the housing needs."

However, a crowd of elected officials, supporters of The Healing Place and
clients of the center, which started as a homeless shelter, expressed
enthusiasm yesterday for extending the program statewide.

Cynthia Dickerson, who attended a Healing Place recovery program, said it
helped her break a cycle of drug and alcohol abuse and regain custody of
her two daughters, ages 8 and 14.

"I'm really happy to see the governor is taking such a serious look at drug
and alcohol abuse," said Dickerson, who now works as a "peer mentor" for
other Healing Place clients. "I just hope the people that it's available to
will take advantage of it."

Participation in the program will be voluntary, but Fletcher said the goal
is to steer some people into recovery instead of jail.

He said officials want to work more closely with drug courts in hopes that
judges will offer more people the option of treatment instead of incarceration.

Fletcher said the state wants to have one center in Louisville, one in
Lexington and at least one in each congressional district.

Officials throughout the state have complained about the lack of treatment
facilities.

Based on a recovery model, the program is low-cost because it stresses
"peer" counselors - addicts in recovery - to work with residents, Healing
Place President Jay Davidson said. A similar program is used at the HOPE
Center in Lexington in which recovering addicts lead programs that rely
heavily on the Alcoholics Anonymous 12-step plan for achieving sobriety.

Dr. Ken Peters, one of several physicians who help found The Healing Place
15 years ago, said yesterday he was delighted by the expansion.

He said members of the Jefferson County Medical Association who helped The
Healing Place move from a homeless shelter to a recovery program quickly
realized clients needed more than temporary food and shelter.

"We realized we were just recycling people," he said. "If you don't deal
with the underlying problems, you don't have an impact."