Baltimore County officials said they will continue their fight against a private methadone clinic in Pikesville in federal appellate court as costs ? including a proposed $150,000 expert witness ? for the legal battle grow.
County attorneys are planning to appeal a federal jury?s decision in August that a county zoning law discriminates against clients of the for-profit heroin treatment center, county spokesman Don Mohler said.
“We?re extremely confident that we will be upheld in the 4th Circuit,” Mohler said. “County Executive Jim Smith absolutely believes that local government has the right to control land use, and that?s what this case is all about.”
During the three-week trial, attorneys for the clinic ? which provides synthetic heroin to curb addicts? cravings ? argued that an emergency zoning bill passed by the County Council in 2002 banning certain clinics, including methadone facilities, from residential areas violated the Americans with Disabilities Act.
They also said the council denied clinic owner Joel Prell his right to due process when members, particularly District 2 Council Member Kevin Kamenetz, rushed the bill through.
County attorneys maintain the bill protects residents from the criminality associated with addiction. They portrayed Prell, a former pizza shop manager, as a money-hungry entrepreneur looking to cash in on the lucrative business of regulated narcotics.
Prell?s attorneys said they don?t know on what basis the county can appeal.
“They will claim certain errors,” lawyer Steven Barber said. “We don?t know what their exact basis is.”
On Tuesday, the County Council will discuss spending $150,000 on expert consultant, psychiatrist and Yale University lecturer Sally Satel. The renewable 23-month contract lasts through September 2008 and sets Satel?s rate at $350 an hour.
But the county already spent $35,000 on Satel?s services for the trial ? without the council?s approval ? according to legislative notes.
By law, the council must authorize all expenditures of more than $25,000 per year.
Kamenetz, a Democrat, said the council could retroactively approve the funding.
“We don?t like it, but if it happens, it happens,” Kamenetz said. “Would the council have approved it in the first place? That should be the focus.”
