Drug & alcohol rehab center, residential rehab facility, community living arrangement, intermediate care facility, extended care facility. Some of the above, all of the above, none of the above? What will it finally be, FHRE, or will it continue to shape-shift even after you open?

All of these names have been used by FHRE over the past year to describe to the public what their plans are. Confused? So are we. Against all odds, FHRE is plowing ahead full force to put their full-scale commercial operation at Fox Hill by trying out yet another definition. This month they became a “community living arrangement.”

Is this the kind of business we want in our community—one that avoids all accountability to citizens and local authorities in the town where they wish to do business? Is this the kind of commercial zoning precedent we want to establish—carte blanche, not only in Camden but statewide?

Do we really want to allow any nursing home, assisted living facility, hospice care center, or other rehab centers to rename themselves a “community living arrangement” and be able to locate in any of our neighborhoods, employ as many people as they would like, cause traffic, lights and noise, and answer to nobody?

A commercial facility offering full rehabilitation services while claiming to be a community living arrangement is unprecedented in this state. As much as Fox Hill insists that the plan is legal, there is no precedent for their request. Overnight they have turned a local zoning debate into a statewide concern; the issue potentially impacts every neighborhood in Maine.

Carla Ferguson, Camden