Hundreds of Haddonfield citizens filled the Haddonfield Memorial High School auditorium last Wednesday night to hear what real estate developer and Recovery Centers of America CEO Brian O’Neill plans to do if he were to purchase Haddonfield’s Bancroft site.
O’Neill unveiled at the community meeting his Haddonfield Recovery Center of America would feature a 120-bed facility with in- and out-patient care in “boutique, hotel-like accommodations.”
O’Neill started off the meeting talking about RCA’s mission, which is “to provide education, treatment and recovery support for substance use and mental health disorders in every neighborhood in America” with the goal “to get 1 million Americans into meaningful recovery.”
He plans to accomplish this with eight rehabilitation and detoxification centers throughout the Northeast. Although none have been completed in America, he is working and planning to make these facilities modeled like boutique hotels with chandeliers, plush beds and up-to-date exercise facilities.
“The addictions industry puts its patients in a cinder-block room with four beds and a bathroom down the hall. I’m bringing the hospitality industry to the treatment world,” O’Neill said.
Since RCA will be a paid, voluntary-stay facility, O’Neill said it will cost patients a daily rate of about $750 for inpatient services, then $4,000 a month for inpatient recovery and a daily fee of $65 to $1,100 for outpatient services, which will be offered 24/7.
O’Neill said drug and alcohol problems, especially in Haddonfield, are a “raging epidemic.” He supported his claims with daunting statistics as well as drug- and alcohol-related news articles nationally as well as locally.
In the end, O’Neill said he wishes for a “win-win outcome” for RCA and Haddonfield. Although O’Neill has kept silent about the price of the center, last Wednesday, he said a similar center in Massachusetts cost about $25 million to acquire and build. He also said the center would create about 1,380 jobs and contribute about $300,000 to $500,000 in annual property taxes to the borough.
He was met a mix of hostility and politeness by members of the crowd, receiving boos as well as commendations. While citizens did say a drug and alcohol treatment facility has its benefits and would be great to have, most were against putting it at the Bancroft site.
“While I desperately realize the need for this kind of service, my major contention is just that this is the wrong place,” Bob McCoy said.
Most objections revolved around the safety of the children at Haddonfield Memorial High School and Tatem Elementary School, the traffic problems that could be caused by the center and that the proposed plan didn’t meet the variance required on the site.
“The high school is what we would call a ‘target-rich environment,’” Chris Maynes said.
He then proceeded to show O’Neill pictures of his children, whom he all felt were susceptible to possible dangers from patients and drug dealers who might come in the area because of the facility.
O’Neill attempted to dispel those claims by saying the facility would not accept violent criminals or sex offenders; that the patients would be so busy with their schedules they wouldn’t have much free time to wander throughout the area; that the traffic generated by the center would be less than 10 percent; and that RCA would apply as a behavioral health treatment facility, keeping within the parameters of the variance.
In opposition to the claims of the older citizens at the meeting, HMHS students between the ages of 18 and 19 came to speak in support of having the RCA facility so close to home. They felt there is a drug and alcohol problem in Haddonfield, and that students would benefit from the rehab facility.
“I am that child that parents worry about,” HMHS student Matthew Smart said. “HMHS already has a drug and alcohol problem. We are the school that had a seventh-grader show up drunk to rec hall. We are the school that had students sell drugs to other students. This center will not bring a problem that isn’t already there. It’s your job as parents to send them to that center.”
The back and forth between the concerned citizens and O’Neill went for three hours, ending at 10 p.m. when O’Neill ended the meeting, saying he would answer any questions missed through email.
“I am not going to make a decision tonight. But I am going to take to heart everything everyone in this room says,” O’Neill said, in response to Maynes’ request “from one father to another, to go home and think about it.”
