Pubdate: Wed, 14 Jan 2004
Source: Bristol Herald Courier (VA)
Copyright: 2004 Bristol Herald Courier
Contact: http://www.bristolnews.com/contact.html
Website: http://www.bristolnews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1211
Author: Rain Smith And Chris Dumond

ATTORNEY TAKES LEAD TO BLOCK METHADONE CLINIC

BRISTOL, Va. - Attorney Michael Bragg has taken the lead in helping his 
neighborhood stand against a planned methadone clinic on Old Dominion Road.

Bragg knows from working with clients and from personal experience the toll 
drugs can take on a life. And he believes methadone clinics are not the 
avenue to get off drugs.

Through his faith in God and by surrounding himself with the right people, 
Bragg said he has been able to turn his life around.

He was disbarred in 1986 for charging clients for services he did not 
perform. According to records from the state Bar Association, he told 
officials then that he had been drinking and using marijuana and cocaine 
and was unfit to practice law.

His license was reinstated in 1995.

"In my past, I was a drug user, but not ever addicted. I didn't have to 
seek treatment," he said.

Bragg said he stopped using drugs through willpower and faith.

"It's just a question of attitude and doing what is right - having people 
expect something out of you and expecting it out of yourself."

But Bragg, who in the late 1980s was arrested and later acquitted on 
cocaine-related charges, said his past is not the issue.

"I am not the story. The story is the community and Appalachian Treatment 
Services," he said, referring to the South Carolina firm that wants to set 
up a methadone treatment clinic near Lowry Hills subdivision.

More important to him is keeping what he views as an ineffective and 
dangerous drug-treatment center out of the community.

Bragg said he doesn't believe methadone clinics work. Worse, he said, they 
can feed the drug problem. The therapy, he said, takes advantage of those 
who are addicted.

Methadone is a synthetic drug used to wean addicts off substances such as 
heroin and oxycodone.

"There are numerous cases in federal court where there have been oxycodone 
distribution rings where people were meeting paying customers at methadone 
clinics, and that is part of what gets them involved in distribution and 
ultimately locked up in a federal penitentiary."

In his public life, Bragg said, he regularly represents drug offenders in 
court and knows firsthand that methadone is not a successful treatment for 
opiate addiction.

Many of his subdivision neighbors share his view that methadone treatment 
simply substitutes one addiction for another, Bragg said.

They don't want a methadone clinic anywhere in the county, he said.

"We do not believe methadone clinics are appropriate at any place," Bragg 
said. "They are not the appropriate treatment for people with those kinds 
of addictions. They take advantage of the people who are seeking treatment. 
They then cause problems for the community immediately around the clinic, 
and, we think, beyond that to the broader community."

Lowry Hills homeowners, Bragg included, also worry that a clinic at the 
sole entrance to the subdivision would bring with it increases in crime and 
decreases in property values.

The neighborhood now is awaiting a decision from Washington County Zoning 
Administrator Mark Reeter, the county administrator, on whether the 
methadone clinic is permitted under the area's B-2 zoning. B-2 is open for 
general business, including doctor's and dentist's offices and pharmacies.

The decision is expected within the next two weeks.

Bragg said he sees little room for debate. Methadone clinics don't qualify 
as health-care practices in the B-2 zone, he said.

On top of that, Bragg said, the proposed site for the clinic - inside a 
manufactured display home - already is illegal and should have been moved 
years ago.

Bragg, at a recent called Board of Supervisors meeting, cited county zoning 
ordinances stating that manufactured homes are not allowed in the B-2 zone 
unless a public meeting is called. Even then, he said, they can be used 
only as a security post for a business, an office for a manufactured home 
dealer or as an industrial mobile office.

"Its presence there now is illegal, and the county can and should order the 
removal of that manufactured home as an abandoned, nonconforming use," 
Bragg said at the meeting.

Should Reeter's decision go against the wishes of Lowry Hills residents, 
Bragg said, they are prepared to fight it - all the way to the Supreme 
Court, if necessary.

Although he is providing his services free of charge, Bragg said he 
believes he would have no problem gathering funds should a long trial occur.

"I do not anticipate in a case like this that (court costs) would be that 
high," Bragg said. "I believe if I need money for court costs and 
litigation expenses, the word would go out and we would raise it in two or 
three days."

Although Bragg said he doesn't know whether Lowry Hills residents are aware 
of his past drug use, he said he doesn't think it is relevant to the 
methadone fight.

At the called supervisors meeting, Lowry Hills Homeowner's Association 
President Wes Rosenbalm said "drug users come in different levels. And we 
don't want any of their levels in our neighborhood."

Rosenbalm said that remark was in response to a statement explaining that 
methadone clinic users don't have needles hanging out of their arms.

"We all make mistakes and we all have to live with it and pay the 
consequences of our mistakes," Rosenbalm said. "That doesn't take away your 
right to speak on an issue or the same issue years later.

"I knew Mike had run into some problems, and I knew a little bit about it. 
But I don't have a problem with it. To me, it's not a negative issue; it's 
a positive issue. You have somebody who may understand the situation a 
little better."
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman