Sober home in Delray goes to battle with city
Stepping Stones house doesn’t meet a distance restriction city imposed.
Scott Tompkins wasn’t aware he was supposed to file paperwork under new rehab facility rules, but says he runs an exemplary home.
DELRAY BEACH — Scott Tompkins leans back in a lawn chair on the porch of a yellow duplex with blue doors — his mellow disposition surprising for a man braced for battle.
He owns Stepping Stones, a sober home in the Delray Beach duplex that faces closure because he failed to file paperwork with the city, required by rules enacted a year ago. But he’s the first to challenge the series of regulations meant to assuage the saturation of recovery houses in Delray Beach.
Neighbors want him out. Some chided the home at a city zoning meeting in July, describing a derelict house that blasts Ozzy Osbourne tunes at 6 a.m. with men talking on cellphones loitering on the lawn.
Tompkins, awarded a 2015 community service plaque from city police, says he runs an exemplary home. He claims his five residents have a 9 p.m. curfew, attend sobriety meetings, submit to random urine testing and care for one another like family.
“They mischaracterize everything,” Tompkins said of his neighbors, “and I can understand why. Because of the sober homes that have taken advantage of people. Because people are dying in bad sober homes. But we are trying to save them.”
Tompkins is fighting to keep open his 10-year-old recovery home at 602 SE Third Ave. in the Osceola Park neighborhood. The situation has the potential to set the tone in Delray Beach’s battle with sober homes, both critics and supporters say.
“Will the city shut down homes, good or bad, just because they can?” Tompkins asked Monday, while showing Stepping Stones to The Palm Beach Post. “Because I can see the recovery community bringing a lawsuit.”
The neighbors: Homes too close for comfort
Homes with more than three unrelated residents must register
‘They mischaracterize everything, and I can understand why.’
Scott Tompkins
Owner of the Stepping Stones sober home, speaking of the neighbors who want him out
with the city under the city’s new rules. Sober homes must also get certification from nonprofit Florida Association of Recovery Residences, which oversees sober homes at the direction of the state.
But the crux of the Delray guidelines is a distance requirement — sober homes cannot be within 660 feet of one another, unless they opened before the rules took effect and filed paperwork to be grandfathered in. Tompkins didn’t.
He said he didn’t realize he had to register with the city, figuring Stepping Stones was exempt because it offers no treatment, only a place for men in recovery to live.
Stepping Stones is 240 feet from another sober home, according to the city’s zoning department.
He requested an exemption, called a conditional use, which the City Commission will consider this evening.
“This sets precedent,” said former Vice Mayor Jim Chard, who lives in the Osceola Park neighborhood. “This is the first time these ordinances and changes have been reviewed.”
The Osceola Park neighborhood is overrun with sober homes, said Chard and other neighbors.
“It’s just not fair to me that I have to live in an area that’s just inundated like that,” said Ralph Santana, who is five doors from Stepping Stones.
Lisa Quillian, a member of the Osceola Park Neighborhood Association, took aim at Stepping Stones directly. The home has a reputation and is known simply by its street address, “The 602,” she said.
“This home has been nothing but negativity,” Quillian said.
Mayor Shelly Petrolia, who sat on the commission when it enacted the regulations, said Tompkins’ case might signal to the community where Delray Beach stands on the issue of sober home proliferation.
But, she added, it’s a tough line to toe.
The addicts: Are they getting a fair chance?
Delray Beach, and any other governing body, can’t discriminate against sober homes. Addicts are protected under the federal Americans with Disabilities Act.
The distance requirement between sober homes is intended to benefit the recovery community, according to a city study. Those in sobriety benefit from integrating into a traditional neighborhood, but won’t benefit from a cluster of sober homes creating a de facto recovery district.
For that reason, distance between homes is a factor in the city’s forthcoming decision, as well as if and how the home benefits those in recovery, Petrolia said Monday.
“You have to take it on a case-by-case basis,” she said.
Jeffrey Lynne, attorney for Tompkins and Stepping Stones, worries the stigma of sobriety already has hampered Tompkins’ chances at staying open.
“Sober home — it’s used as a pejorative in Delray Beach. Not because it is, but because we associate the term with bad things,” Lynne said. “A true recovery residence is where people support each other no different than any other family should and does.”
Petrolia sent out a newsletter email Aug. 14 with part of it dedicated to Tompkins’ case, under the headline “Sober Homes — Testing the Limits.”
Lynne said the headline indicated Petrolia may be biased, and may have made her mind up before the hearing.
Petrolia only meant that this case is the first test to Delray Beach’s new laws, she said.
Lynne exchanged emails with city attorney Max Lohman, who called Petrolia’s email “nothing inappropriate” and “simply informative.”
The exchange exemplified Tompkins’ fear, one he says he shares with other sober home operators: Good homes are tarnished by the stigma of bad ones.
“I don’t think we’re getting a fair shake,” he said.
The owner: Will good credentials save home?
Tompkins has been sober for 14 years and touts good credentials:
■ He operates four homes — Stepping Stones, one in suburban Delray Beach and two in Boynton Beach.
■ He’s a member of the South County Recovery Res- idence Association, a nonprofit coalition of sober home operators often lauded by the city by operating at high standards.
■ He’s in the process of getting Stepping Stones certified by the Florida Association of Recovery Residences, required by city ordinance but not by state law. The nonprofit wrote in a letter dated Aug. 14 that Stepping Stones has “zero complaints” and is “highly favored and recommended by certified peers.”
The home itself doesn’t stand out in a neighborhood of colorful single-story houses.
The lawn is empty, with only a large mango tree and bright yellow code enforcement sign out front.
Inside, the home has tiled floors and a wood-panel ceiling. The tables and desks are topped with books, mostly Bibles and Alcoholics Anonymous guides.
The home is open mainly to men over the age of 30 battling alcoholism, but occasionally houses younger residents who struggle with opioid addiction, Tompkins said.
He invited the five city commissioners to tour the sober home, saying he said he doubts they’ve been inside one.
Prepared for a fight with city
Technically, the Stepping Stones duplex can operate without city approval if it houses fewer than three people per unit.
Tompkins wants to house up to six men in one three-bedroom unit, and up to three in the other one-bedroom.
The men benefit from having roommates, said Tompkins and a 19-month resident of Stepping Stones, who asked to stay anonymous.
“They say opposite of addiction is connection,” the resident said. “Living with a roommate helps keep you in check. You also keep it together because you know there are other people in the house that need you to.”
Tompkins vows to stay open regardless of today’s outcome.
“We’re not going anywhere,” he said. Operating sober homes brings him “closer to God,” he added.
But if he does lose, he said, he’s prepared to fight.
“The city is testing the limits of the Americans with Disabilities Act,” Tompkins said. “They’ll lose.”