Edward G. Wiznitzer, Lawrence
Last week the Lawrence Zoning Board continued its months long series of hearings on the Sunrise Detox Center.
My sympathy goes out to the members of the board who soon will have to render a decision on a matter that has been overblown by some community activists into a crisis level controversy.
The board’s members are our neighbors who’ve volunteered their time and energy to serve the Lawrence community. They’re now stuck between a rock and a hard place.
I’m sure they want to help their neighbors and protect the beauty and quality of our community. At the same time they are compelled to uphold the law. The plaguing question is whether or not the law can be trusted to uphold the same objective of protecting our community.
The Sunrise case needs to be recognized for what it is. It is a classic nimby (not-in-my-backyard) case. The state court has already recognized “addiction services” to be an “inherently beneficial use.”
Such a use is, by law, considered beneficial to society as a whole including the local community. The “inherently beneficial” category loosens the standards that must be met for such uses to obtain zoning variances.
It curtails zoning boards and municipalities from blocking these uses to locate where they choose. “Inherently beneficial” status exists, in the law, specifically to combat nimby self interests that run contrary to the greater good to our society and community.
Opponents to the proposal are essentially screaming that Sunrise will bring the bogeyman and are instilling fear among the neighborhood.
Everything put on the board’s record says otherwise. The center is not a methadone clinic dispensing daily doses to homeless, indigent addicts.
It is a relatively high-end medical practice that relies on providing a comfortable, home-like environment as part of its therapy approach. That environment style demands a location like the one on Federal City Road. It’s a fairly new style of drug and alcohol detoxification, that zoning laws have largely not yet recognized.
I wish the board well in their endeavor to sift the facts from the rumors, the truth from the unfounded fears, and to trust in the law when they deliberate this case.

