NEWBURY, Vt. — Neighbors of a 280-acre property slated to become home to a six-bed juvenile detention facility are questioning whether their small, rural community is the right place for such an institution.
The proposed Covered Bridge Treatment Center would replace the former Woodside Juvenile Rehabilitation Center in Essex, Vt., which closed in October when there were no residents occupying the jail-like facility’s 30 beds and the state faced legal battles related to employees’ previous use of restraints on young people.
The idea of bringing boys between the ages of 12 and 17 who have committed acts of varying levels of aggression to the town of roughly 2,200 “threatens my perception of Newbury as being a safe place to live,” Joanne O’Meara, a survivor of long-term violence and abuse who lives on Fish Pond Road within walking distance of the proposed center on Stevens Place, said in the first of two recent forums held by the Selectboard online. “You’re going to ruin my life.”
O’Meara, who owns M-Power Fitness for Women on Newbury’s Main Street, and others who spoke during the Feb. 11 forum and another held on Thursday noted that the town does not have its own police department.
They questioned what would happen in the event that one of the young people in the custody of the Vermont Department for Children and Families escaped from the facility, asked why Newbury was chosen and wondered whether having the facility there would affect property values.
But state officials and leaders of the Orford-based Becket Family of Services, which owns the property and would run the facility through a state contract, said in the forums that they hope the scaled-down treatment center could become a national model for how to treat youths involved with the justice system, often because of their own trauma.
The Becket employees working with the boys will focus on building relationships with them while also addressing “the behavior that led them to be with us,” said Laurae Baker, vice president of Becket’s Vermont Permanency Initiative.
The boys are expected to stay at the facility for a short period of time, less than four months, so that staff can assess their needs, stabilize them and help them to move on to a less restrictive setting, which might mean going home or to another treatment program.
The property at the end of the rural Stevens Place, which is west of Interstate 91, has served as a 12-bed treatment center run by Becket for youths in need of a less restrictive setting, with unlocked windows and doors, since 2013. It was previously a bed and breakfast.
To convert the property to a secure facility, plans call for about $3.2 million in renovations. The modifications include outfitting the building with secure windows and electronically controlled doors, adding a video monitoring system, as well as new lighting, a welded wire mesh fence around the outdoor recreation space and a backup generator in case of power outages.
It also is expected to cost about $3 million annually to operate the facility, which would employ 42 people, DCF Commissioner Sean Brown said during one of the forums.
Becket has not previously operated a secure facility nor did it set out to do so, said Jay Wolter, Becket’s chief administrative officer. But with the closing of Woodside, Wolter said, “that presents a risk to Vermont and to providers like Becket.”
While Covered Bridge would be a secure facility, Wolter said the needs of the boys who would arrive there would not be all that different than those they care for in less secure settings.
To move forward, Becket will need a conditional use permit from the Newbury Development Review Board. It also will need a license to operate the program from the state. DCF and Becket are still working through details of their contract, Brown said in a Friday phone interview.
Ultimately, Brown said, the goal is to open the facility by the end of this year. In the meantime, children who otherwise would be sent there are being cared for in other residential programs in Vermont.
If children in DCF’s custody need specialized treatment, they are also sometimes sent out of state, including to the Sununu Youth Services Center in Manchester, Brown said, adding that no Vermont children are currently at the Sununu center, which is currently facing wide-ranging allegations of systemic abuse by employees.
Brynn Cole, who lives on Fish Pond Road, said her parents served as therapeutic foster parents when she was growing up in West Newbury. She worries that without proper treatment, the adolescents in the state’s custody are at risk of becoming incarcerated adults, she said.
“As long as this program continues to focus on small-capacity restorative justice (and) trauma-informed care, really wholly respecting the humanity of the youth in its custody, I think I absolutely support this,” Cole said.
Some of Cole’s neighbors, however, expressed further concerns about safety issues should the boys in DCF custody escape or if they should need emergency services themselves when the weather is bad.
“What happens when it takes three to five hours to sand the roads in the middle of the night?” asked Marc Krulewitz, a Fish Pond Road resident.
At the end of Thursday’s meeting, the Selectboard, as well as state and Becket officials agreed to participate in another discussion later this month.
“We want to maintain an open dialogue with the community leadership, as well as the community itself,” Brown said.
That discussion is scheduled for 6-8 p.m. March 18 via Zoom. Attendees can find the video chat by following http://bit.ly/newburybecket or by phone at 312-626-6799.
Nora Doyle-Burr can be reached at ndoyleburr@vnews.com or 603-727-3213.
