SECOND CHANCE BELIEVES IT'S DOWN TO LAST CHANCE

It's an ordinary strip mall in a Calgary industrial park, but for
hundreds of methadone patients, it represents the loophole that will
save their clinic, or the noose that will finally kill it.

By this time next week, Second Chance Recovery will know whether a
last-ditch attempt to find a home in Calgary is a success -- and if it
isn't, the 500 addicts who use the clinic are out of luck.

"Just as a practical matter, I think this one is the last straw -- if
we don't get this, I think it's over," said Hugh Ham, the lawyer who
speaks for the forsaken treatment centre.

"I don't know if we could do any more."

Two months after promising to vacate a Braeside strip mall in the face
of neighbourhood fear and fury, Second Chance is now eyeing an
industrial area, where Calgary's silly rules may not apply.

The loophole, in a city which doesn't allow medical clinics to operate
in industrial zones, is the vacant space is in a strip mall, where the
city does allow clinics.

Ham said the strip mall's landlord is sympathetic, and they are now
determining whether the clinic can legally operate without the city
shutting it down.

"By this time next week, we'll know if we're making the application to
move in," said Ham.

It'll be the fifth attempt by the private facility to find a home in
Calgary.

Faced with ridiculous zoning rules and communities filled with
loathing over druggies trying to get better, it's been a hopeless
quest so far.

Second Chance was downtown until angry neighbours forced it into a
northeast industrial area.

Then the city demanded the clinic close because it violated zoning
laws.

An aborted move to Forest Lawn fell through after residents and
businesses complained, so Second Chance moved to the southwest
community of Braeside, into a vacant walk-in medical clinic.

It would have been the ideal location if the community hadn't erupted
in furious opposition, threatening protests and vandalism if it didn't
shut down immediately.

So, in early July, Second Chance announced it was closing for good,
leaving 500 patients in the care of Alberta Health Services, and
abandoning a city too selfish to allow addicts a place to heal.

It was a bitter ending -- or it would have been, if the promises
hadn't starting flying, convincing Second Chance to try again.

Alberta Health Services, perhaps fearing their own drug-treatment
clinics would be swamped with new clients, offered to help find a new
home, far from Braeside and city zoning disputes.

City council, finally shamed out of its stupor, ordered a review of
the daft rule which prevents medicine in industrial areas.

Moving with the speed for which city hall is famed, a study is due in
November, at which point, the tedious process of changing the bylaw
will get started. Maybe.

In the meantime, 500 addicts on the path to sobriety wait and wonder
where their next allotment of craving-reducing methadone will come
from, when Braeside closes in the near future.

Ham laughs bitterly when asked about the help promised to the clinic
- -- as soon as the media stopped watching, he says, the helping hand
was withdrawn.

"(Alberta Health Services) suggested we go into the former Holy Cross
hospital space, but the people running the Holy Cross were absolutely
not interested, and that was it -- we haven't heard a word since,"
said Ham.

The answer from Alberta Health Services to this apparent lack of help
is vague.

A spokesperson says there was no official directive to help the
clinic, so what assistance was offered isn't officially clear.

Ham says the lack of help was of no surprise to the doctors running
Second Chance.

"The province has absolutely no intention of helping them and the city
has no intention of helping them, and any community association that
even hears about it has every intention of inviting them to a
lynching," said Ham.

And so, using their own resources, the clinic found a loophole, in an
industrial area.

The location remains a secret. When you're treating addicts, it's
clearly better to stay in the shadows.

"If you report where it is, we'll face a firestorm," said Ham.