SPURNED REHAB SENTER SUES DEBARY, PREPARES TO OPEN

DEBARY -- Operators of a controversial substance-abuse outpatient treatment
center are gearing up for a fight with the city after being told last month
to leave amid resident opposition.

Daytona Beach-based Stewart-Marchman Center is suing DeBary -- calling the
City Council's vote in early January against the facility illegal -- and
could open as soon as today.

"The City simply abandoned its responsibility to one of its landowners, in
order to avoid political disfavor of the masses," attorneys for the center
argue in their complaint, filed Jan. 26 in Volusia County Circuit Court.

City Manager Richard Diamond determined in December that the center was
allowed under both the "general" and "medical" office provisions listed
among the appropriate uses for property zoned "business planned-unit
development." The council overturned that finding.

Stewart-Marchman bought the 3,000-square-foot building and adjacent
property off U.S. Highway 17-92 for more than $400,000 in November and
planned to relocate from a smaller, leased facility in Deltona that opened
in 1993 to serve the center's west Volusia clients.

Plans to expand to a larger building in Deltona failed in 2002 because of
community opposition.

First established in 1970 as a court-ordered substance-abuse program in
Daytona Beach, Stewart-Marchman Center now has 300 employees working at 11
facilities in the east Central Florida region. It served more than 7,000
people in 2003. The center's programs include detoxification, adult and
adolescent residential treatment, education and preventive services.

According to Stewart-Marchman, although only 6 percent of its overall west
Volusia business comes from DeBary, most -- nearly 60 percent -- comes from
nearby Deltona and DeLand.

On Friday workers were busy putting the final touches on the DeBary
outpatient location, which is in a business park next to the 500-home
Springview subdivision.

"We anticipate the initiation of client services on or about February 2,
2004," reads a message on Stewart-Marchman's Web site.

If that happens, the city has several legal options, ranging from code
enforcement to a court injunction, City Attorney Kurt Ardaman said.

"Any use inconsistent with the zoning of the property can be dealt with by
a number of legal mechanisms by the city, if that's what they choose to
do," he said.

Ardaman said he had not seen the lawsuit as of Friday.

About two months ago, residents of three nearby subdivisions learned of the
nonprofit substance-abuse treatment provider's plans to open a few hundred
feet away, at 356 Engelnook Drive. More than 100 people, most of them
opponents, attended a Jan. 7 council meeting to address the issue.

At the meeting, the council voted 4-1 to reject Diamond's previous
interpretation of DeBary's code.

"I was not entirely convinced that it was a 'medical,' as such, building,"
Vice Mayor George Coleman said of his decision to vote against the center,
adding that the issue is now a legal one that is no longer up to the council.

"I can't argue with them now. They've heard our decision and they weren't
satisfied. I can't blame them for that," he said.

Scott Grissom -- who lives in the Reserve at DeBary subdivision next to the
Springview business park -- said he does not want the center's
court-mandated clients near his two young children. However, he remained
optimistic the opening may not mean it will have clients.

"There's a difference between opening and seeing patients," Grissom said.