Why he’s building an addictions rehab centre for people out on bail

I saw the property come on the market and I mean this whole time I have been looking for places for a center as well so I wasn’t really certain what I was going to find but yeah as soon as I walked onto the property I knew it was

Exactly what it was going to be used for and so the thing about this house is that it has the like a perfect floor plan for what we want to do and I couldn’t have asked for a better layout for what we’re trying to do know four

Bedrooms upstairs and you know a big kitchen and dining room and a nice living area and a beautiful property and there’s even a on the main floor there’s a big area to be used for a classroom for the learning the individual that comes here the only reason they’re going to come

Here is because they want to get out it’s not just going to be a get out of jail free card it’s going to be a person that’s very serious about change and then they’re going to come here and have the opportunity to change the people delivering the program

Here are essentially we are all professionals but we’re also peers because we’re people with lived experience and therefore an individual who’s very raw and new to recovery is going to be able to relate to the person who’s teaching them the skills that they need to acquire and and the reason why

They’re going to believe in that person is because they’re going to be able to see that that person has been exactly where they were and then so they know and they have the road map to show that person how to get out the big compon of

The program is just how to live life everyday life so some of the stuff that you and I might take for granted might be a skill that somebody who comes here may not have may not have been taught preparing breakfast or uh learning how to cook or um you know having table

Manners and uh things like that that that that we just take for granted um some guys may have never had the opportunity to learn that’s where I think our program is definitely going to excel is that uh um we have that understanding so we want to make sure

That we have all the bases covered before we send an individual back out into the community and so that they’re well equipped and know how to make a doctor’s appointment and uh you know know that they need to get to the dentist every six months and and how to

Schedule that and how to have a health card and etc etc and simple things but so essential to to to life I first met Manny in the early part of 2017 and we were bunked together and he’s a great guy he’s a older guy and he’s uh had a

Lot of experience with incarceration he’s been to the penitentiary and he was coming through on a on a breach so he was in the provincial institution with me and we were in a unit that was under lockdown and segregated so we spent 23 hours a day together in a Cell so you

Really get to know somebody and then I got out he got out and then later in 2017 and I came back in and he was already back in and then we ended up getting bunked up in the the same cell on the same range again when you’re

Leaving a a jail they open up the door and then you have an option it’s like you can go be free and do anything you want or you could go try something new in a different city and challenge yourself and it’s scary and you know 99

Times out of a 100 you choose I’m going to go free and so Manny went home and he went back to doing the things that he had done and he used and he overdosed and he died like I told you before about Manny that he always wanted to look out for

The next guy he knew what the plans were and he he encouraged me and he said you know you have to do this you have to do this you have to help out these guys that are coming through and um so he’s just a huge encouragement to me while he

Was living and then the circumstances surrounding his death really cemented all of the reasons why intervention needs to be made available to people who are willing to make a change while they’re incarcerated

Five years after being granted bail and attending an addictions treatment program in Ottawa, Spencer Kell is now working to open a similar centre in Lanark County for people with addictions who are awaiting trial. Kell says he wants to help others break the cycle.

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