Members Hold Vigil to Save Sonoma's Orenda Center

Hundreds jam parking lot of beloved residential program

The battle to save Sonoma County's Orenda Center - a revered, 37-year-old substance abuse rehabilitation program - entered a new phase with a candlelight vigil and rally on Wednesday, March 26. Nearly 400 supporters jammed the Orenda Center parking lot for the vigil, many of them clients or former clients who had gone through the rehabilitation programs.

The county has announced plans to close the inpatient residential and outpatient programs, leaving only the drug testing and detox functions intact.

"The residential program is the heart of Orenda, and they want to cut out that heart," explained Barbara Knight, an eight-year employee at Orenda and an organizer of the vigil.

Representatives spoke from the religious community and other rehabilitation programs, praising Orenda for its long record of success in steering abusers out of drug and alcohol dependency and toward productive lives.

What now? Speakers urged vigil-goers to e-mail the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors and explain to them the need for Orenda's residential program services. Please add your voice to theirs:

Mike Kerns, Chair mkerns@sonoma-county.org Mike Reilly, Vice-chair mreilly@sonoma-county.org Valerie Brown vbrown@sonoma-county.org Paul Kelley pkelley@sonoma-county.org Tim Smith tsmith@sonoma-county.org

The real power of the vigil was felt during the "open mike" period, when three dozen past and present clients and family members - crossing a full spectrum of age, class, and race - came forward to testify for Orenda and against the proposed closures.

Women came with their children to relate how Orenda treatment had allowed them to reclaim their roles as parents. One told how her son had become a desperate drug abuser, gone through Orenda, and now was pastor of a church in Lake County. Another former client said he now manages a 100-bed rehab facility, thanks to Orenda helping him to kick his alcohol dependency.

They made the point again and again: Orenda's sliding scale and cheaper fees resulted in higher success rates than way more expensive private programs.

Orenda (from the Iroquois language, meaning "the spiritual force that enables human accomplishment") was founded in 1970, one of the first clinics in the U.S. to run on the "social model" developed in Canada. The social model focused on a spiritual, 12-step philosophy, augmented with group therapy and individual and family counseling.