The Healing Place is an innovative treatment center for the homeless modeled after a successful rehabilitation program in Kentucky. The Raleigh facility will be on a four-acre site near the Dorothea Dix campus and will treat 165 men.
Local businesses and non-profit organizations are working side by side in the effort.
"It truly has been a labor of love," says Errol Frailey of the Downtown Raleigh Alliance. "I think everyone really did come together on this one because they saw the need for it."
Right now, more than 1,500 men, women and children call the streets and parks of Raleigh home. Close to 80 percent of that population has an addiction problem.
Unlike the current shelters in Raleigh, The Healing Place will offer more than just a hot meal and a place to sleep. It will also offer rehabilitation.
"We will accept people into the shelter that are slightly intoxicated or slightly high," says Dennis Parnell, executive director of The Healing Place. "There's no other facility right now that can handle that situation."
Once in the program, the men will go through detoxification, as well as attend classes, job training and follow-up counseling.
It is also unique in that the men do all the work themselves -- from cooking and cleaning to teaching the classes. The Healing Place treats the whole person as it helps the men to help themselves.
The Healing Place should be completed in about a year. Once the work is finished, organizers plan to start working on a similar shelter for women and children.
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