Construction Maison

And is the city’s high ranking fair ? People working in addiction recovery explain the various factors at play in Wilmington. By Taylor Knopf By some measures, Wilmington, N.C. ranks number one in the nation for opioid abuse . But for all its problems, the city’s residents and those in the addiction recovery community say that reputation is a bit unfair. “There are a lot of different theories about why it’s so problematic in Wilmington specifically,” said Michael Page, a North Carolina Harm Reduction Coalition worker who helps operate a mobile needle exchange in Wilmington. NC Harm Reduction Coalition ’s Michael Page. Photo courtesy Michael Page . “I feel that it has a lot to do with the polar opposite, which is recovery. Wilmington is a mecca for recovery,” he argued. Page and others in the area say that there are close to 300 twelve-step meetings a week in the city. It’s filled with halfway houses and substance abuse outpatient programs . It’s also important to note that accordin...

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. - There are two things that everyone can agree on: We need to protect children from abuse. And the current system, under the aegis of the city Administration for Children's Services, needs fixing. So where do we go from here? A series of stories in the Advance recently laid out many of the shortcomings in the system. ACS case workers are given ridiculously large caseloads to manage. Many of those workers come to the job fresh out of college, so they have little experience. The hours are long. The pay is low. It's not a pretty milieu. Case workers often see the worst of humanity. Parents who brutalize their children. Homes where drug abuse and domestic abuse are rife. Clients can be confrontational and violent. Some of the worst neighborhoods in the city are an ACS employee's workplace. Gut-wrenching decisions have to sometimes be made to remove children from their parents. It can be soul-killing work. The kind of work you bring home with you. It's...

Late on a humid Sunday afternoon , July 30, at Twin Oaks apartments on East 36th Street , about a dozen residents mingle under a large oak tree . Some sit on stoops, others pace. Some sit quietly, others discuss the conundrum they've found themselves in through no fault of their own. "I just don't know what I'm supposed to do," one woman stammers between sobs. The residents are young, old and in between. Some have lived here for nearly a decade, some moved in this year. One thing all of the neighbors share in common: they don't know where they'll be living on September 17. Each resident living in the 18 remaining units in the complex — two other units were heavily damaged by fire in February — received a letter on July 13 stating the company they were leasing from, Beatty Investment Homes LLC (BIH), had sold the property and would be knocking it down. Local development firm The Drakeford Company (TDC) and builders Shea Homes plan to build more than 30...