Government
‘We Want To Have Some Oversight’: State Legislators Take Up Proposed Bills Regulating Sober Houses
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State lawmakers are developing a series of bills that advocates say are designed to regulate “sober houses,” the introduction of which in New Canaan has sparked wide community discussion as well as neighborhood opposition. Referred to the Connecticut General Assembly’s Joint Committee on Public Health, one proposed bill calls for an amendment to state law that would require new sober houses “to register with the municipality in which they are located and become certified by their municipal health authority or district department of health prior to operation and in order to be eligible to receive state funding.”
The same “Act Concerning Sober Living Homes” also would require existing facilities to register and obtain certification locally in order to receive state funds. That proposed state law and others seeking to regulate sober houses are to get hearings in the Public Health Committee and from there could go to both houses of the legislature and, with support, to the governor. They could become law at the end of the session in early June if not sooner, according to state Rep. Michelle Cook (D-65th) of Torrington, who sits on the committee and proposed another bill. Under Cook’s bill, sober houses would be required to register as businesses in the towns in which they’re located as well as with the state Department of Public Health, and to have Naloxone or “Narcan”—a life-saving drug in cases of opioid overdose (such as in New Canaan recently)—on premises, with tenants trained in its administration, if anyone in the facility has a history of opioid addiction.