Sovereign Health Launches Fourth Installment of 'Beyond NIMBY' Editorial Series

SAN CLEMENTE, Calif., Oct. 31, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Sovereign Health, a leading national provider of behavioral health treatment services, announces the fourth installment of its newly-launched editorial series, "Beyond NIMBY." NIMBY is the acronym of the phrase "Not in My Backyard" and represents the strong opposition by residents to having group homes, sober living homes and facilities that provide treatment and other supportive services to people who have disabilities located within their neighborhoods. "Beyond NIMBY" is Sovereign's second series in the Not in My Backyard phenomenon. This latest article, "Two neighboring SoCal communities express alternate ways to regulate sober living homes," takes a closer look at Oceanside's regional town hall meeting on sober living homes that was held by California legislators on Monday, Oct. 3. The piece also explores Rep. Darrell Issa's (R-Vista) new legislation, called the Safe Recovery and Community Empowerment Act (H.R. 6070).

Sen. Patricia Bates (R-Laguna Niguel) co-hosted the town hall, during which she discussed the difficulty state legislators have had with passing bills to regulate addiction treatment facilities and sober living homes due to federal and state anti-discrimination laws. "We are continuing to work on state solutions in the coming 2017-2018 session, which begins in January. We hope to receive feedback from residents by participating in these community forums," said Bates.

At the Oceanside meeting, Issa also discussed the challenges in balancing the needs and wants of residents living in the community versus the behavioral health patients seeking treatment in those same communities. "We've had alcoholism in our country for generations and it continues … we often have, quite honestly, a mentality that we'd like to see those people getting taken care of, but we don't want to see them in our neighborhood," Issa said.

Unlike the San Clemente town hall meeting, Oceanside's City Councilman Jerry Kern, Assemblyman Rocky Chávez (R-Oceanside), residents and other attendees were much less concerned with removing sober living residences from their community and much more concerned with increasing the city's licensing, regulating and overseeing capabilities of these homes and ensuring that there were not too many people living in the homes and that they would receive adequate treatment. Only 20 miles away, San Clemente's meeting had a much different tone.

The launch of Sovereign's five-part groundbreaking, inaugural NIMBY series released in August sparked an outpouring of discussion by residents in Southern California and throughout the country as it shined a light on the most critical issues of the NIMBY movement.

As part of the local community, Sovereign Health cares about the issues related to sober living homes and residential treatment centers, and the concerns of local residents about what goes on in their communities. To follow Sovereign's Beyond NIMBY series, follow the story on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, Instagram and YouTube with #NotInMyBackYard, #NIMBY, #SanClemente, #Crimes and #SovTalk.

About Sovereign Health 
Sovereign Health's mission is to provide a broad spectrum of high-quality behavioral health treatment services for adults and adolescents, including support services for family members. One factor that differentiates Sovereign from other treatment providers has been the company's ability to offer separate mental health and addiction or dual diagnosis treatment programs at its facilities. For more information, visit www.sovhealth.com.

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