The Walker Center about ready to open The Walking Sober House; community invited to open house

GOODING, Idaho (KMVT/KSVT) — The Walker Center is getting ready to open the doors to their new sober living facility.

The Walking Sober House is the Walker Center’s newest addition to help people who are in recovery.

“The Walker Center needed to add to our service delivery so that people in early recovery have a safe and supportive place to live,” said Debbie Thomas, the CEO of the Walker Center.

At the new home, located at 745 California Street in Gooding, people will be able to apply to have a safe and sober place to live.

They will have to meet certain requirements in order to live in the home.

“Individuals when they live here, they will have life skills groups, anger management, emotional regulation, nutrition, budgeting, and then they will have the opportunity to have community service, giving back to other people and helping this community so that you get outside of yourself, and give to the community,” said Thomas.

A new live in facility manager will be on site at all times.

Steve Swarner has been in recovery himself for more than 12 years, and says it was a house like this one that helped him continue on his recovery journey years ago.

“Helped me learn skills to better deal with people early in recovery, unfortunately you get rid of the drugs and alcohol, and you still got the person underneath right, most of us, I didn’t know how to deal with people respectfully and honestly, you know when you get clean and sober, you have the same behaviors you had when you were drinking,” said Swarner, the new house manager and recovery coach.

The home can help 6 women and 6 men at a time and applications are open now.

Swarner says this new home is something the community has needed for a while, and is excited to be a part of it.

“What I want to do is help people, but I also found is there is a connection you can make with people and that is what I love most about the job,” said Swarner.

An open house will be held on June 1 from 11:00 to 7:00 for anyone in the community interested in learning more.

Applications can be found by calling The Walker Center at (208) 734-4200

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