The Western Tidewater Community Services Board, a regional mental health provider,  has purchased a house in southern Isle of Wight County for use as what county staff have described as a group home.

The $533,000 purchase has drawn objections from area residents for having occurred without advance notice to the facility’s neighbors. Jennifer Boykin, who serves on the county’s Planning Commission, said she’s organized a community meeting with Brandon Rodgers, executive director for the WTCSB, for July 9 at 7 p.m. at the Walters Ruritan Clubhouse at 27746 Walters Highway.

“I learned about it after I had several calls from people on Colosse Road asking why it didn’t have to come before the Planning Commission and the Board of Supervisors and if this was allowed in a rural residential neighborhood,” Boykin told the Times. “After doing some research I reached out to (County Administrator) Randy Keaton since he serves on the WTCSB and he put me in touch with Mr. Rodgers. After a lengthy conversation with him about this facility, I thought a community meeting would be best to quell the rumors that had started circulating and have the facts and Mr. Rodgers agreed.”

Rodgers told the Times the facility is more accurately referred to as a “peer-supported wellness home.” It would offer four beds for stays of up to two weeks as “one of our lowest levels of care.”

“These are not individuals who are in crisis; they have to go through a screening before they would ever be admitted to the house,” Rodgers said.

The WTCSB screens walk-in clients daily and those found to be in crisis are elevated to a higher-level facility, such as an inpatient crisis stabilization unit.

The peer-supported wellness home concept is modeled on a similar facility serving southwestern Virginia, Rodgers said. The 1971-founded WTCSB, which has clinics in Isle of Wight and Southampton counties and the cities of Suffolk and Franklin, is one of 40 regional community services boards that operate as political subdivisions of Virginia for mental health services.

“We are that public safety net for those services,” Rodgers said.

The facility on Colosse Road near Colosse Baptist Church is intended to house people recovering from depression or other mental illnesses who Rodgers said would be capable of most day-to-day activities, such as holding a job and cooking, but “just need a little bit of a boost to sustain their recovery and prevent a crisis.”

The WTCSB closed June 3 on the purchase of the Colosse Road house and anticipates an October opening date following renovations, Rodgers said.

 

Concerns from neighbors

Community Development Director Amy Ring told county supervisors at a June 5 meeting that from a zoning and permitting perspective, the county considers group homes the same as occupancy by a single family.

Ring said county code defines group homes as a residential use type, and as such, a public hearing or vote by the county’s Planning Commission or Board of Supervisors wasn’t required. The county code stipulates “zoning ordinances for all purposes shall consider a residential facility in which no more than eight individuals with mental illness, intellectual disability, or developmental disabilities reside, with one or more resident counselors or other staff persons, as residential occupancy by a single family” and that “mental illness and developmental disability shall not include current illegal use of or addiction to a controlled substance.” It stipulates that “no conditions more restrictive than those imposed on residences occupied by persons related by blood, marriage, or adoption shall be imposed on such facility.”

All that is required from the county for a group home, Ring said, is a simplified site plan showing the operator has a state license and proof of ample parking.

Don Rosie, who represents the Carrsville area on Isle of Wight County’s Board of Supervisors, said he’d asked that the matter be discussed at the June 5 meeting in response to concerns raised by Boykin who represents the Carrsville area on the county’s Planning Commission.

“Yes they didn’t have to inform us but even still the perception and concerns should have been port forward and we should have been informed ahead of this,” Rosie said in an email to the Times. “…If we have any problems I am pushing for closure.”

“I and others in the southern end of the county are sick and tired of the county government and people from the Smithfield end of this county shoving things down the throats of the citizens here that they know the majority do not want,” Boykin’s husband, Volpe.

Volpe Boykin said he doesn’t oppose the facility itself but rather the lack of notice.

 

Who would stay at the house?

Rodgers contends neighbors have nothing to fear.

The facility would be managed by a licensed clinical social worker who will “have a big say in who is allowed in and who’s not,” Rodgers said. The concept also calls for 24/7 staffing in shifts. Staff would not reside in the house.

Prospective residents would be screened for suicidal or homicidal tendencies. Anyone with a criminal record, pending charges, or who’s going through detox from drug abuse would be ineligible, Rodgers said. People with significant cognitive impairment or who are homeless would also be ineligible, he said. The WTCSB operates a separate program to find permanent housing for its homeless clients.

Editor’s note: This story was updated on June 11 at 12:45 p.m. to correct that Volpe Boykin is no longer chairman of the Southern and Central Isle of Wight Citizens Group. The current chairman is Keith Horswill.