While the Dunwoody City Council last July lifted a moratorium on permits for substance abuse and mental health treatment center, the CEO of Southern Live Oak Wellness, which operates several facilities in the city, said changes in the ordinance makes it impossible for his company to expand its operations.
Andrew Merker of Southern Live Oak Wellness, which owns and operates Dunwoody Recovery Place and Atlanta Recovery Place, said the company has purchased other buildings he would like to use to expand services, one of them slated to be an adolescent treatment center.
However, he said the changes to the ordinance that increased buffer zones between existing and new facilities and distances between the facilities and schools makes that nearly impossible.
“Treatment facilities are viewed as the pariah of the neighborhood, but the reality is they need to be in your town to make a difference,” Merker said. “These people are not criminals – they are the soccer moms, the high school kids – troubled people who just need a push in the right direction.”
At last year’s July 22 meeting, the council voted unanimously, based on community and city council feedback, to increase distance buffers for new facilities from a half-mile to one mile from existing recovery communities and community residences. The increased school buffers for recovery communities was expanded to 2,000 feet.
“Staff proposes regulations that balance access to treatment without overwhelming the city’s neighborhoods,” Dunwoody Planning and Zoning Director Paul Leonhardt said at the July meeting. “This text amendment also addresses recent changes in state law.”
City code allows for entities that don’t conform to current zoning conditions to apply for a Special Land Use Permit, an option that Merker said he is exploring, along with other options.
The moratorium had been in place for more than a year to allow staff to research a viable solution that addressed concerns that treatment and recovery facilities would have a negative impact on people living nearby.
Merker said those concerns reflects antiquated views about mental health facilities.
“The days of the sanitarium where you put people away forever are not what the modern level of care is today,” he said. “The people who are in our facilities are not degenerates.”
Dunwoody resident Kathleen Murphy, who is the company’s corporate liaison, said she is a perfect example of the type of person that can benefit from having a recovery community nearby.
Murphy, who worked for 25 years as an executive at The Coca-Cola Company, said she suffered for years with an addiction to Oxycodone.
“I had stopped drinking years ago, but I thought I needed chemicals to cope,” she said. “My tolerance had built up, and I was no longer getting high. I was just spending more and more money to feel normal.”
One night in 2022, Murphy was lying in bed, praying “that I didn’t wake up the next day.”
“I was sick of the lies, the isolation, the shame and the guilt, and I was sick of hating myself for not believing that I could beat it,” she said.
Her time in a treatment facility, she said, saved her life. Dunwoody Recovery Place was not yet open, so she went to another town to receive care.
Murphy started in an inpatient facility after taking a 90-day leave from Coke, and then continued using outpatient services at Atlanta Recovery Place in Dunwoody for the next nine months.
When she returned to her job, her absence was not discussed, with the exception of her boss and a few close work friends.
“We live in the kind of culture that nobody discusses things like that,” she said. “I started to think that this job wasn’t really serving me anymore.”
She said she believes in Southern Live Oak Wellness because many key people in the organization are former addicts, which gives them a unique perspective in treating patients.
Southern Live Oak Wellness offers treatment plans tailored to both adults and adolescents, focusing on substance use disorders and mental health, including depression, anxiety, and PTSD. It has locations in Dunwoody and St. Mary’s, GA.
