How It Works: Recovering Citizens in Post-Welfare Philadelphia Review

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How It Works: Recovering Citizens in Post-Welfare Philadelphia ReviewThis is a definitive look into Philadelphia recovery homes. Readers learn that Philadelphia has a national reputation or its network of drug and alcohol assistance centers available to abusers to seek services. Philadelphia is responding it a crisis, as the Kensington section of Philadelphia leads the nation in per capita heroin and cocaine purchases. Temple University assists several centers. It is important, though, for a person to have insurance and identification in order to receive most formal services.
Many recovery centers provide unofficial, unregulated services to people with problems with drugs and/or alcohol. There are 30,000 abandoned homes in Philadelphia that attract recovery centers, as they often materialize inside an abandoned home. There are approximately 400 to 500 recovery homes in Philadelphia. None are government regulated. Most operate by word of mouth. Many attract people from out of state. Newark and Baltimore hospitals are known to give substance abusers one way bus or transit tickets to Philadelphia. Churches and local governments in Puerto Rico give abusers one way plane tickets to Philadelphia.
It is debatable how good the services are that are provided, and they may vary greatly amongst the recovery homes themselves. To some, the provide hope and improve the lives of the most troubled substance abusers. To others, they provide unqualified services in illegal and shoddy housing conditions.
A person typically enters a recovery house by agreeing to place one's General Assistance, Social Security, and food stamps into a group pool. In return, the person receives housing and participation in a traditional 12 step recovery program to attempt to overcome problems with drugs and/or alcohol.
These homes create challenges for residents. Most exist in neighborhoods where drugs are readily available.
Many recovery homes have strong local political support. Home recovery residents provide Election Day campaign labor for State Rep. John Taylor, who in return is an advocate for these homes. Recovery home residents were also noted being involved in campaign for officials such as Mayor John Street, Rep. Chaka Fattah, and Sen. Arlen Specter. One group of centers, One Day at a Time, provided 50 to 60 Election Day workers form Sen. Specter. Specter then helped provide a $250,000 unrestricted grant to One Day at a Time.
Residents are used for lobbying purposes and are sent in buses sent to Harrisburg seeking support from state legislators. Some political leaders oppose these homes. City Council member James Kenney argues many of the homes are operated by corporations with no credentials, no insurance, and provide substandard housing in return for profit.
Some houses have failed and, instead of helping people, have reverted into becoming homes supporting drug use and other criminal activities, such as prostitution.
Since the recovery home facilities operate without licensing, there is little government does to close exploitative recovery centers. The only government oversight is for basic housing matters from the city's License and Inspections Department (L&I). It takes a complaint made to L&I to get an investigation as whether a place is warehousing people. The License and Inspections Department has no official category for "recovery house". The author argues L&I lacks the funds and means to inspect all of the homes. The author also suspects some recovery homes may bribe L&I inspectors to overlook infractions.
Day care centers are licensed and inspected by L&I. Licensing could require the homes to follow proper zoning which could be enforced by L&I. Some believe this could reduce houses that warehouse, or overpopulate their homes. Some believe this would matter little, as some believe L&I is ineffective. Further, L&I is concerned only with the physical structure and not the program quality. L&I seldom issues "cease and desist" orders because they know the residents would then lose housing and many would be back on the street. State Sen. LeAnna Washington has fought to keep recovery homes open to reduce homelessness and to keep addicts from committing crimes.
The author interviewed L&I officials as well as state Public Welfare Department officials. They agreed they lack the finances and staff to inspect and monitor recovery houses.
Recovery homes are recognized by people in related institutions. Hospital employees, probation officers, and social workers refer patients to some recovery homes.
Most recovery homes teach residents the traditional Alcoholics Anonymous instruction that a resident has no ability to overcome drug and/or alcohol problems alone. The residents love all ability of self-governance. Indeed, the author argues "a central purpose of this book, therefore, is to understand something more broadly about the relationship between the techniques of self-government---as embodied in recovery---and systems of power" within their communities, including political, social, and spiritual/religious institutions.
To some, the recovery homes teach people how to become responsible for themselves, become responsible citizens, and achieve upward social mobility. These homes are seen as improving moral values and encouraging civil participation. Some advocates sees recovery home residents as resources for community improvement, The residents can work on cleaning-up neighborhoods and work on neighborhood crime watches.
The author sees the recovery homes are a reflection of current social services ideology where government programs dating back to the New Deal are responding more to private markets. Recovery homes are private institutions operating for a profit.
This book explores how some recovery home operators have utopian visions of improving society by resolving the difficulties faced by illegal drug use actions.
The author argues recovery homes are an unintended consequence of state law and the welfare reform movement that has led to a rise in informal delivery of social services; some of which take advantage of their clients. The author finds many recovery home residents return to their drug and/or alcohol use. This keeps these residents in these homes and these homes continue having a large supply of clients. The author discovered much informal transfer of patients between legitimate recovery program and the illegal recovery homes. Thus, the recovery homes have become part of community structure which tolerates them, declines to intervene to stop them, and often works with them.
The recovery homes operate to make a profit. Residents are recruited by word of mouth. Some advertise with flyers. Operators of recovery homes often recruit residents at Alcoholics Anonymous meetings. The residents often must attend recovery meetings, pay rent, and perform work, such as cleaning and repairing the house. The system breaks down regular, as clients often leaves, sometimes without notice, as it is difficult to enforce rules within an illegal and informal system.
The author found one person estimates a house could have monthly bills of around $600 with small houses earning $2,500 to $3,500 monthly with large houses earning $5,000 monthly before bills. Another stated an even larger house had $5,000 monthly costs while earning $20,000 monthly profit. Another observer noted that a row home can be purchased in Kensington for $5,000 to $20,000 or rented for $350 to $500 per month, with the owner charging $180 to $200 per month plus half of one's food stamps. The author notes many homes struggle financially. The market system responds as operators of successful homes entice residents from failing houses to leave and move into their homes.
Recovery houses prefer residents who receive public assistance. Their checks are more dependable than most others'. The operators are careful not to claim to be a rehabilitation facility, as these are regulated and require licensing. The author observed an Attorney General inspector checking on the status of a house and how the operator knew not to cross that legal line. The author also observed recovery homes bending the law and violating the law in order to complete paperwork to obtain utilities.
Pennsylvania enacted its Welfare Reform Act 75 in 1982. The law redefined eligibility for public assistance such that a person could no longer receive public assistance unless the person fell into one of several categories, such as having a disability or for being a substance abuser. This had the unintended consequence of creating cheap housing capturing the public assistance paid to substance abusers.
In 1995, Pennsylvania eliminated transitional needy General Assistance benefits for substance abusers. In addition, Social Security Insurance was not allowed for substance abusers. This led many substance abusers to become classified as chronically needy in order to receive public assistance benefits. This had the unintended consequence of making recovery home more economically stable.
The criminal justice system is a part of the recovery home network. Treatment Court offenders and paroles are sometimes sent to recovery houses. Clients sometimes move from government-funded homes to non-funded homes.
Philadelphia city government officially approves only Coordinating Office for Drug and Alcohol Abuse Program (CODAAP) homes. Some of these homes have contracts to handle cases from the criminal justice an system and for handling homeless people during below freezing weather. In 2004, the City of Philadelphia funded 23 CODAAP homes. This compares to the estimated 400 to 500 homes in Philadelphia operating outside this official...Read more›How It Works: Recovering Citizens in Post-Welfare Philadelphia OverviewOf the some sixty thousand vacant properties in Philadelphia, half of them are abandoned row houses. Taken as a whole, these derelict homes symbolize the city's plight in the wake of industrial decline. But a closer look reveals a remarkable new phenomenon—street-level entrepreneurs repurposing hundreds of these empty houses as facilities for recovering addicts and alcoholics. How It Works is a compelling study of this recovery house movement and its place in the new urban order wrought by welfare reform. To find out what life is like in these recovery houses, Robert P. Fairbanks II goes inside one particular home in the Kensington neighborhood. Operating without a license and unregulated by any government office, the recovery house provides food, shelter, company, and a bracing self-help philosophy to addicts in an area saturated with drugs and devastated by poverty. From this starkly vivid close-up, Fairbanks widens his lens to reveal the intricate relationships the recovery houses have forged with public welfare, the formal drug treatment sector, criminal justice institutions, and the local government.

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