RINGGOLD, Ga. - Supporters and opponents packed city hall Monday night to weigh in on a methadone clinic looming over downtown.
The Ringgold City Council does not have a say in whether the owners of Ringgold Treatment Center, set to open in the coming weeks, can operate a methadone clinic on Highway 41, just a couple of blocks away from the city's main stretch of businesses. That decision is up to Georgia's Department of Community Health.
But even so, protesters organized online, deciding they needed to make their voices heard at the council meeting Monday night. And hearing about the protest, supporters of the clinic also organized, telling the councilmen the clinic will benefit the community.
"The drugs are already in your community," said Alan Fuller, of Maryville, Tenn., who provides security consulting to some methadone clinics. "Unlike a lot of other substance abuses, abstinence does not work for a large percentage of opioid addiction. A lot comes back to the chemistry of the narcotics themselves."
"Putting more methadone on the street is not the answer," Catoosa County Coroner Vanita Hullender said. "We need to look at the doctors who are overprescribing opioids."
Hullender referenced the argument other opponents of methadone clinics have made: Owners of the clinics are providing drug addicts with more drugs. Those owners, however, say the science is on their side. Addicts of drugs such as heroin cannot completely withdraw from the drugs and continue to function. They need small doses - like the methadone - to keep them stable as they try to recover from addiction.
Monday's hearing did not involve any action from the city council. Mayor Nick Milwood pointed out that a state agency determines whether a clinic is approved. The Department of Community Health already signed off on the Ringgold Treatment Center. The only thing in the city's hands is to determine whether the clinic can get its business tax license.
That won't require a council vote. Milwood said the city administrators will check to see if the Ringgold Treatment Center owners actually got approval from the state agency before issuing the tax license.
The debate that played out on Monday mirrors one going on in the state Legislature, in part because of the push from local politicians in Northwest Georgia. State Sen. Jeff Mullis, R-Chickamauga, and state Rep. Tom Weldon, R-Ringgold, sponsored legislation to put a one-year moratorium on more methadone clinics in the state.
Now, a study committee has formed to examine whether more restrictions for these clinics need to be put in place.
In the meantime, though, the Ringgold Treatment Center is on the verge of opening. Its owners applied for a license from the community health department in May, a couple of weeks before the moratorium began.
On Monday night, Zac Talbott, who owns a clinic in Chatsworth, Ga., told the council that these clinics are medically sound and will lower overdose deaths in the community. He said he was a drug addict himself before going through treatment at a clinic like this. Talbott added that such clinics include counseling.
"Remember the face of people like me," he said. "These aren't junkies in the alley."
Jessie Thornton, who owns United Karate Studio down the street from the clinic, said he doesn't like bringing drug addicts to a center so close to children. There is also a school bus stop across the street.
"We have kids every single day running up and down these streets, training to get their black belts," said Thornton, wearing his own karate uniform. "I wouldn't mind if they moved it somewhere else. But not in the city of Ringgold."
Contact staff writer Tyler Jett at 423-757-6476 or tjett@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @LetsJett.