Don: Queen Anne parents should stop stigmatizing kids in drug and alcohol recovery

Some parents in Seattle’s Queen Anne neighborhood started a movement to stop a plan to open a high school for students recovering from drugs and alcohol across from an elementary school. But now others in the neighborhood are speaking up for the kids in recovery, saying they should have the space.

KIRO Radio’s Don O’Neill is a resident of the neighborhood where the Seattle School District plans to open a branch of its Interagency Recovery School at the old Queen Anne High School gym. His young son might even attend the nearby elementary school, John Hay.

“I would have no problem with my son attending that school, which he may next year, and having those kids in recovery across the street, knowing they’re going to be very well supervised,” says Don.

The high school will require students maintain their sobriety to remain at the school, but some parents have voiced concern about whether the high school students in recovery might relapse or bring at-risk behavior to the neighborhood.

“What if people they have been associated with in the past show up at the school, directly across from our children’s playground. We just believe it’s not a safe location,” says Christina Economou, a parent with a first grader at John Hay Elementary School.

But Don doesn’t see these young people in recovery as a threat to the elementary school students.

“They should be more concerned about the road in front of the elementary school and the cars that are going back and forth, and the buses going back and forth, that could hit a child, than they should about those kids across the street.”

Don calls the opposition from the elementary school student parents an overreaction. He commends the school district’s effort to get these students into a place where they have a better chance for recovery.

He also asks the elementary school parents to imagine if it were their kid facing this kind of struggle in a few years. “I think if those were her kids when they were older she’d be like hey those parents over at that elementary school are being ridiculous.”

“There has to be enough room in the neighborhood and the village for everyone,” says Don. “I think that sends a really bad message to kids in recovery and it really stigmatizes them, and we need to support them.”