By John Loftus

Times Staff Writer

Want to draw a crowd to a neighborhood meeting? Let it be known a drug-addiction program will be discussed. People will show up.

Some will come with questions; some, with attitude.

That's what happened on Oct. 27, when the Millbrook Civic Association met at the Calvary Athletic Association on Deerpath Lane. So many people turned out to get information about Parkside Recovery's addiction program that they had to troop out of the small room in which the civic group usually holds its meetings and set up their chairs in the gym.

Many said they didn't know Parkside has been doing anything more than mental health counseling in the eight years since it's been operating on Knights Road, and they questioned whether drug treatment is appropriate for an area frequented by children.

There are schools, a library and the Northeast Family YMCA near Parkside at 11082 Knights Road.

Even after descriptions of the counseling Parkside offers to those with mental health, addiction problems or both, as well as repeated declarations that methadone is not distributed there, few in the crowd seemed satisfied.

Neighborhood resident Brian Peters said he didn't question the need for the work Parkside did, but where the work was done.

"It's just a bad spot," he said to the applause of many at the meeting.

SAFETY'S THE TOP CONCERN

Millbrook Civic Association's president, Joseph Fox, had similar sentiments.

"It is up to the MCA and the community at large to take every measure to keep our children safe," he stated later last week in an e-mail to the Northeast Times. "We are not arguing the point that Parkside is providing a valid and needed service in the community."

But he pointed out that Parkside is near three grade schools, two day-care centers, a public library and a youth athletic organization, all on Knights Road.

"We do not want to expose our children and homeowners to the patients/clients of a drug/alcohol recovery and rehabilitation program," Fox wrote.

Parkside therapist Jennifer Rawls, who resides in nearby Morrell Park, later asserted that the program's clients are from Millbrook.

"They're neighborhood people," she said. "Every time I go out somewhere, I see my clients."

Abuse of the prescription painkiller Oxycontin is a big problem in the neighborhood, she said, and Parkside is helping people shed their addiction. She added that a majority of her clients are drug-free. Some use the drug Suboxone to help them stay off drugs.

"We're not trying to promote drugs in the community," she said. "We're trying to take drugs out of the community."