From Tassinari v. Salvation Army, decided Monday by Judge Leo Sorokin (D. Mass.); I'd love to hear what list members think of it:
[Plaintiffs] assert that TSA [The Salvation Army] maintains a policy at its Adult Rehabilitation Centers that prevents such individuals from accessing medication for their disorder [including methadone and buprenorphine for Opiod-Use Disorder [OUD]], in violation of Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, 29 U.S.C. § 794, and the Fair Housing Act, 42 U.S.C. § 3604…. [The Salvation Army] operates twenty-nine Adult Rehabilitation Centers ("ARCs") in that territory. TSA refers to ARC participants as "beneficiaries." ARCs provide beneficiaries with housing and basic living necessities for six to twelve months, during which time beneficiaries live on site and participate in "work therapy" by working full time at the ARCs or processing donated goods for resale at Salvation Army thrift stores….
TSA views ARCs as "residential churches," and it considers the operation of ARCs to be one of the ways it practices its religion. TSA considers "the highest priority of the ARCs" to be "bring[ing] the beneficiaries into a personal relationship with God." ARCs "serve[ ] men and women with social, emotional and spiritual needs who have lost the ability to cope with their problems and provide for themselves."
Beneficiaries need not be Salvationists—the vast majority are not—and they may continue to practice their own religion if they do so on their own time. But all beneficiaries are required to acknowledge that The Salvation Army is a church and must agree to participate in Salvationist religious activities as a condition of their ARC participation. Beneficiaries meet at least biweekly with their assigned spiritual counselor. They must also attend Sunday morning chapel services, a midweek service, daily devotions, and weekly Bible classes.
Abstinence from alcohol and addictive substances is a core tenet of The Salvation Army's religious beliefs. sincerely believes, as a matter of its religion, that long-term use of narcotics to treat addiction is not true rehabilitation, and that "abstinence and the power of God unto salvation is the only form of successful rehabilitation."
TSA requires, as a condition of ARC participation, that beneficiaries abstain from alcohol and certain drugs [including methadone and buprenorphine]. Beneficiaries must submit to urine drug testing when they apply for ARC admission and at regular intervals thereafter. Applicants with positive urine tests for a proscribed drug are generally required to "detox" before admission, although under some circumstances ARC policy permits such an applicant to be admitted if they have not used drugs for the prior forty-eight hours….
TSA operates other social-service programs, and in some of those programs, it permits—and even provides—buprenorphine and methadone to participants with OUD. At TSA's Harbor Light Centers, for instance, TSA permits participants to use buprenorphine and methadone if those MOUDs are deemed medically appropriate for the participant and as consistent with state and federal guidelines. Harbor Light Centers include state-licensed halfway houses and certified "residential subacute detox" and "intensive outpatient treatment" facilities….
