NORWAY – Proposed legislation crafted by three Oxford Hills towns to control methadone clinics would strengthen the state’s hand in the licensing of such facilities as well as require more frequent counseling and physician oversight for clients.
Norway, Paris and Oxford drafted the emergency legislation earlier this year with support from the Maine Municipal Association and the Androscoggin Valley Council of Governments. The bill was passed over by the Legislature but was then accepted on appeal by the state Legislative Council without an emergency preamble.
All three towns have been considered potential sites for methadone clinics, which treat people addicted to OxyContin and opiates including heroin. The towns are limited by federal law in their ability to control such clinics, which prompted them to enact their current development moratoriums while they reviewed zoning ordinances, gathered information about the issue and drafted the legislation.
Titled “An Act to Improve Substance Abuse Rehabilitation Services,” the legislation would require the Maine Office of Substance Abuse to consider the need for a clinic in the community where the license is being sought. The legislation also would require the state to notify the municipality about any license application within five working days of the application’s being made.
It also would require more frequent counseling of patients and stronger physician oversight of them. It also calls for a security officer on site during hours of clinic operation for the first two years of operation.
State law already requires the Office of Substance Abuse to periodically enter, inspect and examine a treatment facility and its programs and procedures. A major change in the proposed legislation is requiring the state to work more closely with municipalities, Fergus Lea, planning director at AVCOG, said Monday.
“We realize that there are clinics needed, but we want to have some local say in the operation of these clinics,” he said.
The proposed legislation also calls for the creation of an advisory committee that will periodically review clinic operations and address concerns in the community.
According to the Office of Substance Abuse, Oxford County had the fourth-lowest number of clients admitted to methadone clinics between July 1, 2000, and June 30, 2004, among the state’s 16 counties. There were 15 clients from Oxford County admitted to methadone clinics during that period.
Lt. Jon Tibbetts of the Oxford Police Department said he communicated via e-mail earlier this year with municipalities that have methadone clinics, including South Portland, Waterville, and Westbrook, to gather information about any impact the clinics have had in their communities. Police officials cited incidents of property crime since the clinics opened, Tibbetts said.
However, law enforcement officials made no direct link between crime rates and methadone clinics. “I’m sure there is some positive change, too,” Tibbetts said. “The drawback is most people see the negative change versus the positive change.”
Joe Massey, deputy chief of the Waterville Police Department, said there have been problems in that city that he said were associated with its methadone clinic, and he shared his concerns with communities in the Oxford Hills region.
“We have seen some criminal activity associated with the clinic and obviously that concerns me,” he said.
Massey said there have been traffic stops in which the driver was leaving an appointment at the clinic and was operating under the influence of methadone. One driver hit a telephone pole.
There was also an incident of aggravated assault on the clinic’s premises, and clinic patients have told Waterville police officers that they illicitly sell some of their methadone supply, Massey said. Children have also been left in parked cars outside the clinic, unattended for long stretches of time, he said.
Sharon Jackson, Paris town manager, said she and her counterparts are scheduled to meet with officials from the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency in January to gather more information about the issue. “I think we would get the perspective from that end,” she said.
The Office of Substance Abuse estimates that 12,000 to 30,000 people in Maine need treatment for opiate addiction or dependence. “That tells me that there are a lot of people who need this type of treatment,” Jackson said.
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