By Krystal Smalley
ksmalley@wbcowqel.com
Recovery breeds recovery and that’s what Hope Over Heroin and G.R.A.C.E. aim to achieve, albeit in slightly different ways.
During Crawford: 20/20 Vision’s Public Safety and Drug Abuse committee meeting Thursday afternoon, Pastor Dan Rebon announced a Hope Over Heroin event that will be held in downtown Bucyrus June 23 and 24.
“I believe this is a very huge thing that is going to be happening in our city,” Rebon explained to the members present.
Hope Over Heroin, a Cincinnati-based ministry that travels across the U.S., brings ministries together to focus on drug issues in the region. A city of resources will be set up in downtown Bucyrus for addicts to gather information and to seek help. Free food will also be offered during the two-day event.
“This whole thing is about Jesus Christ,” stressed Rebon, a former alcoholic who overcame his addiction by finding his faith. “I don’t know how to explain it other than this: we’ve got more than a medical problem, we’ve got more than an emotional problem in our city. We’ve got a spiritual problem.”
Rebon was frank during the meeting as he discussed how they could help people overcome the demons of their addiction.
“What this is going to do for our city is this is going to tie us together,” Rebon said. “There’s a lot of factions in our city, a lot of fractures. A lot of people don’t know what other people are doing. What this helps us to do is pull everything together so that we’re more unified for the same cause.”
Though Rebon acknowledged the importance of the annual Community Care March, he said that oftentimes addicts do not turn out for those events.
“We’re just unified to say, ‘hey, there’s a problem,’” Rebon believed. “What this does is that we’re going to be more unified in a way that we’re going to face the problem together. The committee that is being formed is going to get the drug addict out of the dark place.”
The event costs $17,000, which includes a full stage, but Rebon and the Bucyrus Ministerial Fellowship are already well on their way in securing funds. Rebon said they already have $4,000 collected and another $4,000 pledged. They have also asked participating churches to give $1,000.
Rebon added that they have already teamed up with the Bucyrus Police Department and assured everyone that arrests would not be made at the event. Rather than punish anyone, they will give them help.
“This is not an end in itself. This is a tool that is going to be used to help do that,” Rebon said.
Additional outreach opportunities will be taking place across Crawford County throughout the months leading up to the event.
Anyone wishing to donate to the local Hope Over Heroin event or to find more information can contact Pastor Mike Corwin at the Bucyrus United Methodist Church Administrative and Outreach Center at 419-562-5061. More information on Hope Over Heroin can be found at www.hopeoverheroin.com. Volunteer opportunities will also be available.
On another branch of the addiction recovery tree, Ken Fraser, outreach director at Beachside Rehab, announced that they are actively looking for quarters to house their G.R.A.C.E. (Give Recovery a Chance Everyday) rehabilitation center in Crawford County.
Fraser was in Bucyrus last November to help host the G.R.A.C.E. event at Suburban Lanes. Hundreds of people turned out for the event and Beachside Rehab was able to place roughly 30 people in treatment facilities in Florida and Ohio with the help of free scholarships.
That event served as the tipping point for Fraser and his group to realize the need for an addiction treatment facility in Crawford County. Though the Florida-based Beachside Rehab is a for-profit organization, the proposed G.R.A.C.E. facility would be a not-for-profit center that would offer detox, residential, and outpatient care.
Fraser said they are currently looking for grants to fund their facility and properties to get it going.
“We want to build a G.R.A.C.E. center here in this town. There’s a huge need,” Fraser said.
Bucyrus Police Chief Dave Koepke agreed. He noted how law enforcement agencies across the county cracked down on dealers in the area between 2013 and 2015, but pointed out the demand for drugs that was still running rampant. His police department is now taking the initiative to get people immediate help when they show up on his department’s doorstep in the throes of withdrawal, but opportunities are not always available right away.
“We saw such need and came back a couple of times to look around,” Fraser said. “We’re going to need all of your support and we’d like to build a world-class treatment center here.”