“I didn’t really know a lot about it,” Kaitlyn said in a December interview. “He just told me that it was a treatment center and that I could benefit from it.”
The residence in Clancy is one of two Hope Center Ministries locations in Montana, including a men’s program in Butte, and 36 nationwide. Though it’s described as a “drug addiction treatment center” on its Facebook page, the national admissions coordinator who testified at Kaitlyn’s November 2021 hearing in Boulder described it as a “long-term faith-based drug and alcohol recovery program.” On its national website, Hope Center Ministries says its purpose is to “lead addicts and their families to become fully devoted followers of Christ.”
The prosecutor on Kaitlyn’s case, Jefferson County Attorney Andrew Paul, argued for a different route, telling the judge he thought Kaitlyn needed clinical addiction treatment. He asked Hope Center’s then-admissions coordinator, Ashley Drake, what kind of doctors the organization had on staff at the house where Kaitlyn would be going. None, Drake replied. But she said the program would transport residents off-site for any necessary mental health care needs, medication or diagnoses.
“But you would agree with me that medical staff would be appropriate for somebody who is chemically addicted to substances, wouldn’t you?” Paul asked.
“Well, that would really depend upon which recovery approach that you choose,” Drake answered.
Unregulated Recovery
Hope Center Ministries, which opened its Clancy home in 2020, is one example among many of unlicensed and unregulated sober living residences currently operating in Montana. The programs can offer housing and support to people coming out of jail, prison, or clinical treatment, but there is no state oversight of the services they provide. Like most states, Montana doesn’t require sober living facilities to be licensed by the state in order to operate. Unless they provide clinical services that merit licensure as a residential treatment facility, sober living homes in Montana are also not required to employ licensed addiction counselors, social workers, or psychologists. (...)
During Kaitlyn’s hearing, Hope Center Ministries’ admissions coordinator, Drake, explained that the year-long program includes 24-hour supervision, Bible study and a mandatory “vocational training program” in which residents work at local job sites that hold staffing contracts with the ministry. Eventually, she said, residents gain more privileges around the home to help them prepare to transition back into the community. Drake said the income residents generate through their work placement helps pay for the cost of their stay in the home, and also serves as a main source of revenue for the program.
Sam Martin, Kaitlyn’s attorney, told Judge Berger that releasing Kaitlyn to the Clancy home would help keep her in compliance with the terms of her probation and give her the advantages of a supportive environment.
“Their program focuses on providing not only recovery aspects for addiction, but also life supports and general betterment of someone, if you will,” Martin said, adding that the program would help Kaitlyn “get out of the cycle that she is currently in.”
Paul, the county attorney, disagreed.
“Judge, to call this treatment is quite a stretch since they don’t have any sort of medical personnel that are available to assist somebody with their chemical addictions. It’s basically a kumbaya. ‘We’ll take care of you for money.’ And that’s all it is,” Paul said. “It is simply a place where Hope Ministries is making money.”
Berger eventually sided with Martin and agreed to refer Kaitlyn to the Clancy program as a condition of her continued probation. He stressed that he did not have the power to mandate her attendance at Bible study or to complete any religious service, but affirmed that she was agreeing to abide by the rules of the program to which she had applied. (...)
After about six weeks at the home, Kaitlyn began working roughly 40 hours a week at one of Hope Center Ministries’ contracted vocational training job sites, a burrito restaurant on the Carroll College campus in Helena operated by Sodexo, a national food service company. Sodexo did not respond to MTFP’s questions about its work agreement with the ministry.
Kaitlyn and two other former residents who worked at different Helena businesses told MTFP they did not receive paychecks from their job placements and weren’t scheduled to receive payment until the last eight weeks of the program — a phase, Drake had testified, during which residents learn financial responsibility and companies can “actually add them on” as employees.
“You weren’t paid,” Kaitlyn said of the ministry’s vocational training program. “It got sent to the Hope Center.” (...)
Hope Center’s vocational training program serves two primary purposes, according to the organization’s national website. It’s meant to help residents bolster their work ethic during recovery while providing “additional income for the ministry.” In federal tax filings from 2019, the last year for which the Internal Revenue Service has a complete filing publicly available, Hope Center Ministries reported that “work therapy” accounted for more than $3.3 million of the organization’s nearly $6 million in total revenues that year.
Kaitlyn and two other former residents who worked at different Helena businesses told MTFP they did not receive paychecks from their job placements and weren’t scheduled to receive payment until the last eight weeks of the program — a phase, Drake had testified, during which residents learn financial responsibility and companies can “actually add them on” as employees.
“You weren’t paid,” Kaitlyn said of the ministry’s vocational training program. “It got sent to the Hope Center.” (...)
Hope Center’s vocational training program serves two primary purposes, according to the organization’s national website. It’s meant to help residents bolster their work ethic during recovery while providing “additional income for the ministry.” In federal tax filings from 2019, the last year for which the Internal Revenue Service has a complete filing publicly available, Hope Center Ministries reported that “work therapy” accounted for more than $3.3 million of the organization’s nearly $6 million in total revenues that year.
Reports of unethical business practices are not uncommon in the recovery industry, including work without pay, financially motivated patient referrals, and profiteering from gratuitous drug testing. Without oversight, the prevalence of exploitative and unethical conduct in Montana has been impossible to quantify. But local authorities and state lawmakers have recently begun pushing for more regulatory mechanisms to keep pace with the industry. (...)
"Good Luck'
Whatever recovery industry reforms Montana may advance in the coming months, countless residents have already cycled through sober living residences operating without any standards for quality assurance, best practices or efficacy. While some residents may have left programs with months of sobriety and a vision for their future, others gained much less.
Whatever recovery industry reforms Montana may advance in the coming months, countless residents have already cycled through sober living residences operating without any standards for quality assurance, best practices or efficacy. While some residents may have left programs with months of sobriety and a vision for their future, others gained much less.
Kaitlyn was discharged from Hope Center Ministries in the spring of 2022 after being fired from her job at Sodexo and accused of violating the residence’s rules. She told MTFP she felt sabotaged and unsupported by the program, despite her efforts to graduate. One night, she said, Belling, the program director, drove her away from the residence, bought her a phone from Walmart, and dropped her off at God’s Love, a downtown Helena shelter. Kaitlyn said there was no invitation to come back.
“It felt really shitty, honestly,” Kaitlyn said. “She just said ‘good luck.’”
“It felt really shitty, honestly,” Kaitlyn said. “She just said ‘good luck.’”
by Mara Silvers, Montana Free Press | Read more:
Image:Melissa McFarlin/ MTFP
