Addiction centre plan irks North Vancouver neighbours

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As a former manager in the hotel business, Anemone Dekker was familiar with alcohol's role in lubricating social functions ranging from weddings to funerals and nearly everything in between.

She came to enjoy wine at dinner and then after. At some point, the nightcap moved to lunch and drinking became the habit that controlled her. One day, back in her childhood home of North Vancouver after stints in Europe and the United States, and following a divorce and the death of a parent, she lost a minimum-wage job when her employer smelled alcohol on her breath.

Sometime after that, Ms. Dekker checked in to a nine-bed, women's alcohol and drug recovery house in North Vancouver run by Turning Point Recovery Society, a Vancouver-based non-profit that operates four facilities in the Lower Mainland and wants to build a fifth. Although the proposal is in its early stages, area residents have already raised concerns about bringing potentially violent addicts to the neighbourhood. Those concerns are expected to be front and centre at an information meeting later this week.

Ms. Dekker, who stayed in Turning Point's existing North Shore home for four months after bolting three times from a program in a Vancouver hospital, credits her current sobriety in part to the facility's location.

She could walk to Edgemont Village and connect with friends and family members who lived nearby. "That to me was huge, because I knew the North Shore, it was familiar to me," Ms. Dekker said at a recent interview at the centre, which backs on to a park.

That familiarity is a key part of the rationale for Turning Point and its supporters, including the District of North Vancouver. Backers say people seeking treatment for substance abuse and addiction should be able to do so close to where they live, with family and community support.

Until Turning Point's women's centre opened last year near Murdo Frazer Park, there was no treatment facility for women on the North Shore. There is no treatment facility for men on the North Shore.

"People do struggle with substance abuse and addiction on the North Shore and a recovery house can be part of their treatment," Mark Lysyshyn, medical health officer for the North Shore with Vancouver Coastal Health, said in a recent interview.

"There is a huge amount of stigma associated with substance abuse and mental health," Dr. Lysyshyn added. "People tend to think about them in terms of 'somebody else' – without realizing that someone from their family may need those services at some point."

Unlike halfway houses that cater to people on court-mandated programs, Turning Point facilities – which are licensed under the Community Care and Assisted Living Act – serve people who enroll voluntarily. People are required to be abstinent for at least 48 hours before they check in and are subject to random drug tests. Programs are abstinence-based and clients who break the rules are subject to eviction.

Some clients' costs are covered through government programs, while other clients pay out of pocket or through employee-assistance programs. In terms of track record, about 75 to 80 per cent of clients remain sober a year after they arrive for treatment, says Turning Point executive director Brenda Plant.

The District of North Vancouver and Turning Point are now looking at building a nine-bed facility for men that would replicate the women's centre and be located at a site next to 2414 Windridge Dr., east of Second Narrows Bridge.

Paddi Nikbin, who lives near the site of the proposed new recovery house, has become a spokeswoman for area residents who oppose the facility for reasons that include safety concerns, potential lowering of property values and a steady turnover of residents in what Ms. Nikbin describes as a stable, family-oriented neighbourhood.

"This area is surrounded by residential neighbourhoods, kids, with community centres, with schools," said Ms. Nikbin, who has lived in the neighbourhood for about 10 years. "It's a very high-density residential area."

The district has other vacant sites that would be more suitable for a recovery house, she maintains. She also has safety concerns, especially with a men's home that may house people with violent or angry behaviour.

The North Vancouver RCMP, which provides police service to the District of North Vancouver, says there have been no calls related to the women's recovery house since it opened last August.

In Richmond, Turning Point has run a men's home since 1999 and a women's home since 2011.

"Turning Point has followed all City and zoning bylaws and also respected and honoured all Good Neighbour Guidelines with both their locations in Richmond," city spokeswoman Kim Decker said in an e-mail. "In addition, the City is not aware of any substantiated neighbour complaints."

Asked what she would say to people who are worried about a recovery house next door, Ms. Dekker said she would encourage them to find out all they can about the people and programs involved. "All we really want is to get well and have a productive life," she said.

In April, Ms. Dekker will return to Turning Point – not as a client, but as a support worker, as part of an alumni program that aims to keep former clients in touch with the society even after they have completed treatment.

The open house on the facility is slated for Thursday at Parkgate Community Centre.