C-U SITES CONSIDERED FOR METHADONE CLINIC

URBANA -- The Champaign-Urbana Public Health District has leased office
space at 211 N. Broadway Ave. in Urbana, and the site is being considered
for a methadone clinic, officials say.

Also under consideration as a methadone clinic is the public health
district main office at 710 N. Neil St. in Champaign, said David King,
executive director of the public health district.

The renewed interest in a methadone treatment clinic comes roughly a year
after strong opposition developed to a proposal to open a methadone clinic
in downtown Champaign at 12 E. Washington St. That proposal, by Harm
Reduction Resource, a nonprofit corporation, was later shelved due to a
disagreement between the company and the landlord.

King said he expects to recommend including $80,000 in the fiscal 2002
health district budget for starting a methadone maintenance clinic, where
heroin addicts and other opiate users can get relief from their addiction
by taking a daily liquid dose of methadone. King said the district wants
Harm Reduction Resource to operate the clinic for the district as a
subcontractor.

The public health district's budget will be placed on file at Monday's
Board of Health meeting, which starts at 5 p.m. at 710 N. Neil St.

Final budget approval would come at an April 15 meeting.

King said there is a tremendous need for such a clinic. As many as 30
people in the community make daily trips to Kankakee and other communities
that offer methadone treatment.

"I don't think it poses any hazard to anybody," King said. "The people we
would be treating are no different from the clients we already serve, who
are sitting side by side with pregnant women and young mothers" at the
North Neil Street main office.

"The ones we would attract to a clinic would be the ones who are trying to
get off drugs, who are trying to quit," King continued. "If we can provide
them methadone at a low cost, they can stop injecting drugs, and we can
reduce crime. If you provide methadone to addicts, they then don't have to
steal to pay for a $200-a-day habit."

Three addicts who came to the public health district within the last 18
months and asked for methadone treatment have died, said Julie Pride,
director of the public health district's division of HIV, sexually
transmitted diseases and tuberculosis prevention and management.

"There's a horrific need for it," said Pride about a methadone clinic.

Though no final decisions have been made, Pride said she would like to
share office space in Urbana with the methadone clinic. She said plans are
to move her division, with its 13 employees, to the North Broadway Avenue
office space, which recently was leased for three years from Ray Timpone.

About 75 percent of addicts who inject opiates have hepatitis C and about 3
or 4 percent are positive for HIV, so it makes sense to combine a methadone
clinic with the public health's division that deals with HIV, TB and
sexually transmitted diseases in one office, King said.

"We definitely want to look at that site (in Urbana) because that's where
Julie's staff would be located," King said. "It would be convenient for the
staff."

But King emphasized no final decision on a site has been made, and that
other sites would be considered, including the public health district's
main office on North Neil Street in Champaign.

King said the public health district would probably subcontract with Harm
Reduction Resource to operate the clinic.

Harm Reduction Resource already is a subcontractor for the health district,
operating a needle exchange program for addicts, designed to prevent
transmission of HIV and hepatitis.

King said Kendric Speagle, who runs Harm Reduction Resource, has done a
tremendous job of reaching out to the addict community, which is
notoriously difficult to reach.

Speagle said that besides the 30 people who travel out of town to receive
methadone treatment, he estimates, based on a survey, that 65 injecting
drug users would take advantage of methadone treatment and perhaps 75 to
100 people who snort heroin would as well.

"Methadone maintenance is one of the most effective treatments," he said.
"Methadone makes the opiate-dependant person feel normal. They no longer
have the physical cravings for heroin, and the individual no longer can
feel the effects of other opiates, like heroin."

King said the public health district would have to get state and federal
approval to open a methadone clinic.

That could take months. He said it would take about a year to open a
clinic, which he said would probably be open six days a week and have early
morning and late afternoon hours so addicts could take methadone before
going to work.

Urbana Mayor Tod Satterthwaite said he wants more information about a
clinic before he could say whether he would support or oppose it.

"I do know there are some businesses in the downtown area who have had some
concern," he said.

Laurie Bonnett, executive director of the Urbana Business Association, said
she is concerned about the possible opening of a clinic on North Broadway
because that street "is a main development site" in the city's downtown plan.

"I've asked David King to help educate us and help us understand what this
means," she said. "Certainly, with the development of downtown, this would
not be my first choice."