Message from a "Bleeding Heart"

Today's Statesman carried a column by Dan Popkey reguarding my company, New Hope Community Health...and me.

It's rather surprising for me to read one of Dan's columns and not scratch my head. In the past, he and I crossed swords too many times. Talked to him last week and shared my heart about drug addiction, inmates, and second chances. He did a very fair job with his piece today. However, you'll read that is says we require "men who accept Christ as their savior as a condition of admittance". Actually we only require new program members to understand that we'll be dealing with spiritual issues, if they decide to accept Jesus Christ, it is between them and God.

I'm in Maupin, Oregon right now with a group of boy scouts and dads, 32 total. After just finishing the first day of river training - I'm dead tired! Reading Dan's column refreshed me and Lee Gaupp, as we found a computer in this beautiful little town. You be the judge..

Before you read the whole article, here's a section from the column that captured the heart behind my work -

"Ada County Sheriff Gary Raney said that while no one would want a group home in his neighborhood, offenders have to go somewhere as Idaho struggles to deal with the social costs of addiction. Raney finds Mansfield genuine. "He began his efforts long ago and has done a great deal of good work on substance abuse and sex offenders with no financial benefit, and, I suspect, considerable cost," said Raney. "If he was motivated to make money, I'm certain he could find a lot of easier ways to do it."

I've known Mansfield 15 years. Always a persuasive salesman, his rebirth seems authentic."

I've known Dan Popkey 15 years. Always a controversial writer, his willingness to hear me seems authentic. - Den

August 05, 2007
Popkey: Mansfield earned scrutiny despite good intentions of group home
Dennis Mansfield, one of Idaho's most provocative conservatives, has been born again as a bleeding heart.
Mansfield says he's been transformed by watching his son struggle with drugs. Nate, 26, has spent two years behind bars. So the former lobbyist and GOP is championing rehabilitation. His new for-profit business is opening "staffed, safe and sober" homes for recovering substance abusers.

Idaho now has about 50 such group homes statewide, about 30 in the Treasure valley. Mansfield vows to add 50 in the next year. New Hope Community Health, incorporated in October, has three houses so far. Each holds about eight men who accept Christ as their savior as a condition of admittance.

But Mansfield's encountering resistance. On Tuesday, Boise Mayor Dave Bieter held a meeting with neighbors from Aster Place who complain about noise, parking, trash and the absence of any notice that Mansfield's cons were coming. Bieter is exploring how the city might regulate the homes, but addicts are shielded by federal law and options appear limited.

"It isn't a privilege for them to be in the neighborhood," said Mansfield. "They have a right to be there."

As the meeting ended, Sen. John Andreason, R-Boise, said he congratulated Mansfield for finding a way to "make a lot of money out of your son going to prison for drug addiction."

"Shame on you," Mansfield said, and left the room.

The old Mansfield relished bare-knuckles politics. In 1995, he threatened Sen. Larry Craig with a challenge from the right if Craig didn't back anti-gay, abortion and education initiatives. As a lobbyist, he said Gov. Phil Batt's legacy would "be the blood that dripped off his elbow" when he vetoed an anti-abortion measure in 1998.

In his 2000 race against now-Gov. Butch Otter for Congress, Mansfield said church-going Republicans would reject Otter because of his bachelor lifestyle. Running against Andreason in 2002 and 2006, he labeled the veteran lawmaker "Republican in Name Only."

Otter and Andreason won easily.

The new Mansfield has an unlikely ally: liberal law-making judges. His houses can go wherever he wants thanks to the formerly loathed 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, affirmed by the Supreme Court. The case, City of Edmonds (Wash.) v. Oxford House, Inc., established that the Fair Housing Act protects addicts from discrimination. The court said Edmonds' zoning ordinance, which limited single-family residences to five or fewer unrelated occupants, could not bar a group home with 10 to 12 addicts. (Conservative Supreme Court icons Clarence Thomas and Antony Scalia dissented in the 1995 case.)

Mansfield said the journey of his son, first arrested during the 2000 campaign, changed him. "No matter how much I would say, ‘Just say no to drugs' or any other what I now believe to be trite conservative sayings, it was more than that. The drugs abducted him."

After Nate was caught with heroin, he spent a year in the Ada County Jail. He then spent a year in a Missouri prison, Mansfield said. Recalling his son's extradition, shackled with other inmates, Mansfield sobbed. "I decided at that point that I couldn't do everything, but I could do one thing."

Mansfield began weekly Bible study at the Ada County Jail, where he met prominent developer Larry Durkin, serving two years for grand theft for skimming $740,000 in the development of a Fred Meyer shopping center.

Durkin pitched the group-home business. Mansfield lined up six investors, including himself, staking a total of $450,000. In May, Durkin was allowed work release. His job? Running New Hope Community Health.

Mansfield said he'd been "shamelessly superficial." He's proud that a man he met in jail, who used to go by "Scorpion," calls himself Daniel Dennis. "I've got a gang member out there bearing my name."

He's met and corresponded with dealers who sold his son dope and became convinced that anti-crime efforts like "three strikes and you're out" are "absolute rubbish." "I believe in second chances, and I believe in 22nd chances."

Aster Place neighbors told me they live in fear an ex-con will re-offend and victimize them or their children. They question why Mansfield's program isn't nonprofit like most recovery homes.

"The neighborhood takes the risk, Dennis Mansfield gets the reward," said Gaylon Hughes, who has two children he says have been frightened by offenders and fast-driving friends on the 15-home cul de sac in West Boise

"And he's such a Christian," said Addie Haas, 74, who lives across the street.

Ada County Sheriff Gary Raney said that while no one would want a group home in his neighborhood, offenders have to go somewhere as Idaho struggles to deal with the social costs of addiction. Raney finds Mansfield genuine. "He began his efforts long ago and has done a great deal of good work on substance abuse and sex offenders with no financial benefit, and, I suspect, considerable cost," said Raney. "If he was motivated to make money, I'm certain he could find a lot of easier ways to do it."

I've known Mansfield 15 years. Always a persuasive salesman, his rebirth seems authentic.

But this is a guy who was called a deceitful bully by the late-Senate President Pro Tem Jerry Twiggs. He's earned special scrutiny. If he's selling snake oil, my guess is we'll find out before he reaches his ambition for 50 group homes.

dpopkey@idahostatesman.com377-6438

Comments

[Jay]

I find the "reborn into a bleeding heart" to be a bit over the top, but the rest seems to be fair. I'd like to see him correct the faith thing as well, though.

Your free publicity is coming in faster than I ever imagined.

[John Marker, Sr.]

i like your site

MissouriDrugAddiction

[John Marker, Sr.]

i like your site

MissouriDrugAddiction