Record: Rehab gripes drop

Longtime Newport Beach resident Barbara Roy has an ocean view from her living room, which sits only a few feet from Narconon.

For years, Roy worried about Narconon clients who she said would loiter and chain smoke in the area.

A steady barrage of delivery trucks and garbage pickups past her house also were a nuisance.

The treatment center is cleared for a daytime occupancy of 49 people and 27 at night.

Narconon use to be constantly abuzz with activity, but the place is quieter now, Roy said.

“It’s really calmed down,” Roy said on Friday. “There’s not much activity except for people coming and going.”

The number of police calls for service to drug and alcohol rehabilitation homes in Newport Beach dropped from 2007 to 2008, according to records obtained by the Daily Pilot, and a few of the homes have closed.

It’s been a year since Newport Beach passed an ordinance aimed at thinning out the number of drug and alcohol homes in the city.

Some residents say they’re already noticing a change for the better in their neighborhoods, but other say the city still has a long ways to go.

Roy said she credits Newport’s rehabilitation home ordinance and a city agreement with Narconon for the return of peace to her neighborhood.

“It’s forced them [drug and alcohol rehabilitation homes] to come out of the shadows and be registered,” Roy said. “I give the city full marks. I’m sure the whole coast is watching to see what happens in Newport. It’s making them be good neighbors when they weren’t before.”

Narconon inked a deal in October with Newport Beach officials to vacate its beachfront building by the end of February 2010 when its state alcohol and drug treatment facility permit expires.

Under the terms of the agreement, Narconon must keep its clients from smoking on the beach, alleyways and boardwalk around the building, and minimize traffic in the neighborhood.

The number of police calls for service to Narconon were down in 2008 from 2007, police records show.

Calls for service to Narconon ranged from illegal parking to a suicide threat, the records show.

Police were called to Narconon’s beachfront triplex at 1810 West Oceanfront 17 times in 2007, but only four calls for service were logged in 2008, according to police records.

Calls for service in 2007 included three calls for medical aid, one suicide threat and two calls for party-type disturbances, but also included calls for a municipal code violation and illegally parked cars.

Of the four police calls logged in 2008 at 1810 West Oceanfront, one was an arrest on an out-of-state, fugitive warrant, police records show.

Newport Beach police arrested 20-year-old Nina Greco, a resident at Narconon, in December, said Newport Beach Sgt. Evan Sailor.

Greco was wanted in Illinois for burglary and theft charges, Sailor said.

A Narconon spokeswoman said Friday that the program was prohibited by privacy laws from commenting on the arrest.

“This center has enabled us to help hundreds of people return to their families drug-free and able to lead productive lives,” Catherine Savage, a community relations official for Narconon Newport Beach said in a written statement. “We have worked diligently to maintain our friendly relations in the community, with beach clean-ups and other volunteer work since we moved from Los Angeles to Newport Beach 13 years ago.”

Newport Beach Assistant City Manager Dave Kiff said he continues to get phone calls from residents with concerns about drug and alcohol rehabilitation homes in the city, but the callers typically call upset about the homes in general, he said.

“About 75% have been about rehab homes in general and are not targeted to any one home,” Kiff said. “Very rarely do I get a specific concern. The ones I do get are mostly about profanity, smoking and maybe some kind of belligerent behavior from residents.”

A few of Newport’s recovery homes have shut down in the past year not because of the ordinance, but because of a frigid economy, Kiff said.

Police were called to Newport Coast Recovery, 1216 West Balboa Blvd., eight times in 2007, but there were no calls for service to that address in 2008, records show.

The 2007 calls for service were mostly minor in nature and included two stray animal pickups and reports of illegal parking.

“We do a good job of watching our clients,” said Mike Newman, one of Newport Coast Recovery’s owners.

In January, Newport Coast became the first recovery home in the city to have its application to stay open rejected under the new rehabilitation home ordinance.

The home could be required to close as early as the end of February under the ordinance. City officials recommended forcing the home to shut down because it’s within walking distance to a liquor store and a bar.

Newman said he plans to appeal the decision.

David Diamond, who lives in West Newport on 39th Street, estimates there were six drug and alcohol recovery homes within walking distance of his home a year ago. Most of the homes have shut down or moved, Diamond said.

The drug and alcohol recovery home operator Sober Living by the Sea continues to house clients in two duplexes that sit across a narrow alleyway from Diamond’s home, causing minor annoyances with traffic and recovering addicts who ride their bikes past his house.

Diamond also said he still gets whiffs of second-hand smoke from the duplexes from time to time, but the management at the duplex has been responsive to his complaints, he said.

“I do have real concerns — there are things that are disturbing, but probably if you had that number of people in any house, it would be a problem,” Diamond said. “I’m not against all homes. I do think there is a social benefit to having rehab homes for those dealing with alcohol or drugs, but it’s the over-concentration that has been a detriment to the community.”

Sober Living by the Sea has tried to be a good neighbor even before the city passed an ordinance, John Peloquin, an executive for CRC Health Group, which owns Sober Living by the Sea, said.

“We’re going to continue to do what we’ve been doing,” Peloquin said.

The Sober Living by the Sea duplexes next to Diamond’s home, 4800 and 3980 Seashore Drive, garnered a total of five police calls in 2008, records show. Two of the calls were for illegal parking, and another was for medical aid.

The duplexes generated the same number of police calls in 2007, records show.

BRIANNA BAILEY may be reached at (714) 966-4625 or at brianna.bailey@latimes.com.