Articles

By Christopher Kennedy Lawford
William Morrow
$25.99

Review by David Palmer

“The morning of February 17, 1986, I woke up, as usual, with that weight in the pit of my stomach, knowing that all I had in front of me was another day of dancing with the 800-pound gorilla of addiction.”

And so begins Chris Lawford’s “moment of clarity” as he reports it in his introduction to this great book about how people recover from addictions—in this case 42 well-known people, many of them celebrities.

By David Palmer

On a mid-December afternoon, Sixth Circuit Judge Mary S. McGowan convened Little Rock’s new Veteran’s Treatment Court (VTC) on the third floor of the Pulaski County courthouse, the second of its kind in Arkansas and one of about 40 nationwide.

The mission of the VTC program is to promote recovery and rehabilitation from substance abuse and mental health issues and when successful, which is most of the time, damaged lives and broken families are restored and society benefits.

On the docket in Judge McGowan’s court were ten honorably discharged young men and women veterans whose crimes mainly had to do with drug dealing, possession of cocaine, theft of property and other non-violent crimes.

What happens to them in succeeding months will be the subject of future articles, but for now it is useful to see how the system works and to get a glimpse of how veterans fare in the 40 odd courts already functioning.

First, VTCs, like drug courts, are an alternative to standard courts in that they combine the structure and accountability of a court but with a strong emphasis on treatment.

Wisdom from the Sunday 11th Step Meetings At the Wolfe Street Center in Little Rock

Geno W., with William G. Borchert
Hazelden Foundation

Review by David Palmer

The Eleventh Step: Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.

This book of meditations is a wonderful collaboration of two gifted men, the late Geno W. whose 11th Step meetings at the Wolfe Street Center in Little Rock during the 1980’s had a profound impact on hundreds of people in various stages of recovery, and Bill Borchert, also a recovering alcoholic, and a newspaperman, author and screen writer.

By David Palmer

Last year fewer than six percent of persons with substance abuse disorders in Arkansas were able to access the treatment and recovery support services they needed.

There’s a good chance this will soon begin to change thanks to a $13.1 million federal “Access to Recovery (ATR)” grant, announced last month by David Laffoon, director of the Arkansas Division of Behavioral Health Services (DBHS).

The grant application, facilitated by Cindy Crone at the University of Arkansas for Medical Science (UAMS) was approved by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMSHA) earlier this year and after months of preparations will go into effect January 30.