Neighbors express reservations about planned juvenile detention facility in Wells River
Modified: 3/6/2021 10:18:42 PM
NEWBURY, Vt. Neighbors of a 280-acre property slated to become home to a six-bed juvenile detention facility are questioning whether their small, rural community is the right place for such an institution.
The proposed Covered Bridge Treatment Center would replace the former Woodside Juvenile Rehabilitation Center in Essex, Vt., which closed in October when there were no residents occupying the jail-like facility’s 30 beds and the state faced legal battles related to employees’ previous use of restraints on young people.
The idea of bringing boys between the ages of 12 and 17 who have committed acts of varying levels of aggression to the town of roughly 2,200 “threatens my perception of Newbury as being a safe place to live,” Joanne O’Meara, a survivor of long-term violence and abuse who lives on Fish Pond Road within walking distance of the proposed