TREATMENT FACILITY SET TO GET OVERHAUL

For Some, A Spell At Cedar Lodge Is What Has Kept Them Alive

GUNTERSVILLE - John has a loving wife and three children today, but he was
in jeopardy of losing them - and himself - five years ago.

That is when Cedar Lodge, a substance-abuse treatment facility, came into
his life and saved him and his family. Even though for years he had lived
with a growing addiction to alcohol and drugs that led him to dealing drugs
and stealing, John says, "I never thought I had a problem."

John isn't his real name. He asked for the anonymity that is part of the
12-step program at Alcoholics Anonymous when he talked to The Huntsville
Times recently. He is a great believer in the facility and speaks to other
clients there frequently.

Cedar Lodge, as it is generally known because of the numerous cedars
located on the property north of Guntersville, has operated for more than
20 years out of a former private residence that is more than 50 years old.
A dormitory wing, which houses up to 24 treatment clients, was built 20
years ago.

The building is deteriorating and maintenance costs are high, especially
the $2,000 a month paid to pump out the septic tank. It is prone to
overflow because leaky field lines can't handle rainfall.

The Lodge, which is one of the few co-ed residential treatment centers in
the state, serves people throughout Alabama, according to Director Kay
King. There is currently a wait of four to six weeks to get in, and there
are about 100 people on the waiting list, she said.

The facility is one of the few that offers services to women in North
Alabama. Usually there are about six women and 18 men at the Lodge.

It is operated by Mountain Lakes Behavioral Healthcare, an organization
that addresses mental health and substance abuse needs in a variety of
programs. The agency is governed by a 10-member board of five people each
from Marshall and Jackson counties.

In recent months the board has been raising money for a new building on the
same grounds as Cedar Lodge. New South Architects of Huntsville has
designed a new center that would serve up to 28 clients and cost about $1.2
million.

Jerry Johnson, executive director of the Mountain Lakes healthcare agency,
said about $250,000 in state bond money is available for a new facility and
there have been some private donations. He and other staffers are asking
groups in the two counties for help.

State legislators and members of Congress have also been contacted for
help. Thus far they have provided about $144,000 for the extension of a
Guntersville sewer line to the Lodge property.

Without the high cost of the septic tank maintenance, Johnson said, $2,000
a month could be applied toward a low-interest, tax-exempt loan.

Cedar Lodge gets its operating money from Medicaid, the state Department of
Mental Health, insurance companies and fees charged clients on a sliding
scale according to ability to pay.

Clients come to the Lodge in a variety of ways. There are referrals from
clients, families, doctors, hospitals, the Department of Human Resources,
employers and courts - the latter is how John found his way to Cedar Lodge.

"I started drinking, sneaking around and getting my father's beer, when I
was 9 or 10," John said. "I was just being a kid, wanted to see what it
(beer) was like."

He had always run around with an older crowd, not feeling like he fit in
with those his own age, and by the sixth grade he had been introduced to
marijuana. That same year he was busted for possession and had to spend a
year on probation.

"I enjoyed playing sports in school but that got to be secondary," John
said. "At first it (drinking and taking drugs) was just a weekend thing.
Then it started to be an everyday thing. Still, I didn't think I had a
problem; I was just having fun."

At 16 he quit school and his father told him that if he continued to live
at home he would have to go to work. With money in his pocket, he was
"partying every night," and by 17 he had been introduced to cocaine.

"I was shooting up and drinking every day," John said. "At that point in
time I would take just whatever (drugs) you've got. And I still didn't
think I had a problem."

At 18 he started working construction, a line of employment he calls "an
alcoholic's and addict's paradise. Everybody on the job got high one way or
the other."

He was married at 19 and his first child was born in 1989 and he continued
to "party," without any brushes with the law until he was 26.

"My theory back then was not that I'll never do it (drugs) again but that
they'll never catch me again," he said.

The cost of addiction soon proved too much for his regular job so he turned
to drug dealing, anything from marijuana to pills to crystal meth. Another
baby came five years after the first one.

"If people told me I had a problem, I told them they had the problem, that
they needed to drink a little more," John said. Not long after the couple's
third child was born, drug agents came knocking on his door and he found
himself charged with a drug violation.

A few months later, John said, he started stealing to pay for the drugs and
beer. He was charged again, this time for breaking and entering and
receiving stolen property.

A plea agreement kept him out of prison, but he was ordered to go to Cedar
Lodge for treatment.

His first stop was the Marshall County Court Referral Services office.

"I still didn't think I had a problem and didn't have any idea what court
referral was," John said. "I thought I could con my way out like I had done
in the past."

But those "ladies" in the office were used to people like John, and "things
didn't work out" the way he had expected them to.

"At first I hated them, wanted to burn their houses up," John said.
"Nowadays, I go by their office and hug their necks because I love them.
Between them and the people at Cedar Lodge, they saved my life."

The new facility, about 10,000 square feet of space, would have two
separate wings, one for males and one for females, with the center part of
the building serving out-patients and others.

The goal is to break ground in late September or early October, and the old
facility would be torn down after the new one is finished.

To get more information or make a donation, call King at (256) 582-4465 or
Johnson at (256) 582-3202.