Recovery Resources TN chooses Johnson City to open 15th recovery home in the region

A new men's recovery home is celebrating its grand opening Thursday. Recovery Resources TN has brought its 15th home to the region, with the 14-bed space nestled in Johnson City at 616 Spruce St. Tabitha Edwards, executive director of Recovery Resources TN, said the home will allow 14 men the chance to continue their sobriety journey and be reintroduced to society. "We generally specialize in the re-entry population, which means that everyone we serve has a history of incarceration at some point in their lifetime," she said. "We provide a safe, stable, sober living situation for those men, and then we provide a ton of wraparound community services." Edwards described RRTN as a "recovery community organization," which means RRTN tries to connect people with every available service that may support in their recovery as they pursue a rebuilt livelihood. She added the new recovery home helps meet the need for more resources in Johnson City. "We have a fantastic local treatment here in Johnson City, and there's also several supporting services in the area, so there's always a need locally for that type of support," Edwards said. "It was a win-win between the funding available, the property we already had and the referral resources in the area." Edwards said the house is unique compared to the others spread across Northeast Tennessee and Southwest Virginia because it was fully constructed by contractors rather than already being an available space. Edwards said in 2023, the lot for the home was purchased through the Tennessee Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services Creating Homes Initiative, a grant funding source aimed to help with safe housing options for people with behavioral and mental health struggles, according to the TDMHSAS website. After the grant funding was secured again by RRTN last year, the new Johnson City home was built, with construction beginning in late summer of 2025 and completed in June. She added 10 men have already successfully moved into the home, and three others are on the list to join them, already filling the spaces in the new recovery residence. "We schedule beds out just because of them being released from jails, prisons and the treatment center, so normally we'll get them on the schedule and know that they're coming, and we'll have the house set up for them when they get there," Edwards said. "The house is technically full, although we're still waiting on a few of them to arrive from their various referral sources." Though the home is new, Edwards said she believes the impact it will have on the community will be long-lasting, with her hope being that people's minds are changed on the reputation of recovery and the people experiencing it. "We're strong believers that the stigma of addiction is based largely in part because of what we do as drug addicts when we're deep in the belly of addiction," she said. "It's our responsibility as people in recovery to change the face of how people view not just addiction, but recovery. We consistently empower the men in our program to be invested in their communities, to be a responsible, contributing member of society." The grand opening for the new home will have a ribbon-cutting and open house that is free for the community to attend on Thursday from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. As the date approaches, Edwards said she is eager to see how the home will help shape the lives of the men and bring more recovery to the area. "If you're in recovery, when you visit other areas, recovery is something that's present in every community," she said. "But we're really blessed in our area because we have quite a tremendous recovery community, so it's really cool to get to bring some new men into that process who are not only going to contribute to our community and our society …but they're also going to be helping to create a better community for their children and their children's children."