nothin Hill Addiction Recovery Center Approved | New Haven Independent

Hill Addiction Recovery Center Approved

Langan Engineering

The site of the proposed, approved new addiction recovery center in the Hill.

Cornell Scott Hill Health Center’s plans to build a new three-story, 52-bed inpatient addiction recovery center in the Hill won its final needed administrative approval in a nearly unanimous vote of support from the City Plan Commission.

Commissioners took that vote Wednesday night during their latest regular monthly meeting.

Zoom

Wednesday night’s City Plan Commission virtual meeting.

The local land use meeting took place over the course of six-and-a-half hours via the Zoom teleconferencing app.

Commissioners voted Wednesday night 4 – 1 in support of the site plan for CSHHC’s planned new $20 million, 29,060 square-foot recovery center. That is slated to be built at 232 Cedar St., 149 Minor St., and 649 – 651 Howard Ave.

The health center’s site plan application states that construction should take place between this summer and the winter of 2022.

Commission Vice-Chair Leslie Radcliffe (pictured) cast the sole dissenting vote.

As an individual, I support the project,” she told the Independent Thursday. However, as a community leader who sits on the City Plan Commission, I have expressed the concerns of the Hill as a factor in my decision making. I don’t feel my community fully supports the project because of exclusion from discussion of community benefits.”

The proposed new addiction has been the subject of some controversy in the Hill for a better part of the last year, with neighbors criticizing the project as furthering a concentration of social services in a part of the city that already hosts a disproportionate share.

Svigals + Partners architect Alana Konefal (pictured) said the new addiction recovery center will replace and expand upon CSHHC’s current Grant Street Partnership inpatient services, which are based out of a building owned by the city.

She said that the new recovery center will house a kitchen, cafeteria, and group treatment rooms on the first floor, part of which will be below grade; a main entrance off of Minor Street, a reception area, and outpatient addiction recovery services on the second floor; and strictly residential and longer-term inpatient addiction recovery services on the top floor.

The site plan application states that the building will be constructed between two existing buildings on the site, an office building to the west and the South Central Rehabilitation Center inpatient hospital, which CSHHC also runs, to the east.

The new building will include a courtyard, driveway, retaining walls, and plantings.

Konefal said the courtyard will be fenced and gated. CSHHC Director of Purchasing & Facility Development Shawn Galligan (pictured) said the courtyard will include a basketball net, green spaces, and places for patients to sit outside and eat.

Leslie Radcliffe, a former smoker, asked whether there will be a designated area for people who do smoke to go outside and do so.

Galligan said that patients will be prohibited from smoking while outside on lunch breaks, but that staff will escort smokers out in groups so that those who don’t smoke won’t be exposed to those who do.” He said the health center will also offer smoking cessation programs to all inpatient residents.

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