‘Standing on holy ground’: Samaritan Colony breaks ground on SECU Women’s Recovery Center

ROCKINGHAM — At long last, Harold and Constance Pearson and the rest of the leadership of Samaritan Colony were able to put shovels in the ground on Monday to foreshadow the coming of the SECU Women’s Recovery Center.

This center will fill a major gap in addiction treatment for the region and will operate alongside Samaritan’s men’s center. The Pearsons, both of whom are recovering addicts themselves — Harold a graduate of Samaritan’s men’s facility — have been talking about the idea of opening a center for women for decades, but only within the last five years has it been within reach.

“This is a special day in the history of Samaritan Colony,” Harold said, fighting back tears as he reflected on his 41 years of involvement with the facility. His first eight weeks there were as a resident, and he’s now executive director.

Harold said that in addition to the elected officials — including Commissioners Don Bryant, Andy Grooms and Tavares Bostic, Sen. Tom McInnis and Rep. Ben Moss — Samaritan staff and SECU officials in attendance, the audience for the groundbreaking ceremony included about 15 graduates of Samaritan Colony’s residential addiction treatment program.

David Stogner of Stogner Architecture designed the 12,000 square foot, 14-bed facility, working closely with Constance, program director for the Women’s Recovery Center (WRC). She specified how she wanted the light to filter in, tuned the acoustics to be sensitive to the often compounding traumas that female addicts come in with, and wanted to make it feel like “home” as opposed to vacation, or a hotel or even a treatment center.

Stogner told those in attendance Monday that he hopes Constance’s vision for the building to be complete within the next year. Harold said that they would begin hiring staff about 6 months out from the ribbon cutting, and then will field referrals from partner agencies to get people into treatment.

What brought Samaritan to this point was a series of recent grants and a state budget allocation that put them over their goal of $3.4 million to cover construction costs. They received a $1 million grant from State Employees Credit Union in late September, $500,000 in the recently-passed state budget thanks to McInnis, and recently were awarded a $100,000 grant from both the Cole Foundation and the Richmond Community Foundation.

About four years ago, Harold met with Scott Southern, senior program officer for the SECU Foundation, who told him that it would be much more difficult than he initially thought to meet the requirements to receive SECU funding. Southern told him that they would need to do a year’s worth of capacity planning with a consultant, hire a development director, establish a succession plan for the executive director position, and lay out a formal fundraising plan.

Constance told the Daily Journal last year that going through these steps greatly strengthened their cause, and Harold told the crowd how appreciative he was that Southern set expectations high.

“If it had been as easy as what I thought it was we probably would’ve already been failed by now,” Harold said.

Southern said the morning of the ceremony brought to mind the totality of the “journey” that led to this moment. He reflected on the journey he and SECU’s staff have been through with the Samaritan staff, the journey that the male residents have each undertaken over 50 years of treatment at the men’s center, and the journey women of the region will go through as they take advantage of the services at the WRC.

“It’s just one journey after another,” Southern said. “When you take journeys, the ones you remember the most are the ones you take with other folks walking beside you.”

“I think about this journey that we’ve been on with you as the SECU Foundation and all the growth you’ve been able to encounter over the last four years, and just how thankful I am that we’ve been able to join with you and walk along this journey with you,” he continued. “I don’t think either one of us ever felt like we were standing alone.”

The ceremony comes just a few months ahead of the 50th anniversary of Samaritan Colony obtaining its Articles of Incorporation, which will be in April.

In an interview with the Daily Journal after the groundbreaking, Harold said that the long-range planning has given him confidence that the dedication of those who made Samaritan Colony what it is today, many of whom have passed away, will continue.

“I want that to continue going forward — that same dedication to the mission that we have here, which is providing services,” Harold said, adding that he’s excited to see the WRC graduates return to staff the center as the male graduates have the men’s center, which he says has been key to their success.

Mark Christopher will succeed Harold as executive director. He is a graduate of the program and has been working for Samaritan Colony for about 10 years, according to Harold.

On what allowed Samaritan Colony to have 50 years of success, and to be looking at the start of a new facility, Harold said it’s the spiritual component of their treatment that has made the difference.

“We’re standing on holy ground,” Harold said while standing on a patch of ground just ”over the hill” of the driveway — a metaphorical threshold that all visitors pass over on the way to the center representing a transition to a state of solitude and focus on healing. “Our staff here, we love what we do, we love the men that come here, and we care about them and they realize that when they come in the door.

“We’re firm but we’re fair.”