MEASURE WOULD MAKE OPENING DRUG CENTERS EASIER

The Baltimore City Council voted last night to give preliminary
approval to a zoning law change that would make it easier to open
drug treatment centers in the city, even in residential neighborhoods.

The measure supported by Mayor Martin O'Malley's administration
seeks to broaden the definition of health care clinics to include
the centers and to remove the requirement for council ordinances to open them.

The 15-member council's action last night advances the ordinance to
the Oct. 30 meeting, where it is expected to be up for a final vote.
If approved, as expected, the ordinance would permit outpatient drug
treatment centers - such as methadone clinics - to open in areas
zoned for various industrial and business uses, Councilman Edward L.
Reisinger said.

Opening them in residential areas would require only the conditional
permission of the Board of Municipal and Zoning Appeals.

The zoning change was proposed by the administration, in part, to
head off a legal challenge to existing city rules. A federal jury
ruled in August that Baltimore County officials discriminated
against the patients of a Pikesville methadone clinic when they
enacted a zoning law prohibiting state-licensed medical facilities
from locating within 750 feet of homes. The county's law also
violated the Americans with Disabilities Act.

"The purpose of this legislation is to comply with federal law,"
Reisinger said.

Councilwoman Mary Pat Clarke was the lone "no" vote. She said the
law would not be discriminatory if it included a prohibition against
locating all health care clinics - from dentists' and doctors'
offices to drug treatment centers - from being conditional uses in
residential areas.

"I think we should be fair to substance abuse centers but not at the
expense of residential areas," Clarke said. "We still have the
possibility of these coming into neighborhoods."