HOPEWELL TOWNSHIP — Less than a month after a group home for troubled teens opened on Jacobs Creek Road, neighbors are calling for its closure, saying the staff is unable to handle the violent outbursts of the female residents.

Citing numerous incidents of violence since The Children's Home of Mount Holly moved the girls in, residents who packed the township committee meeting Monday night say they fear for their own safety.

Police have been called at least half a dozen times to quell out-of-control teens at the single-family residence perched along the bucolic Jacobs Creek, they said.

It's a far cry from the quiet, therapeutic group home Children's Home representatives promised they were bringing into town, residents complained. The home opened Dec. 12.

"I think you were sold a bill of goods that these were poor, wayward children who didn't have two loving parents," resident Gary Smotrich told committee members. "When people have to be taken out in stretchers and handcuffs, these are people who present an imminent danger to the neighborhood."

Roy Leitstein, executive director, said the rash of calls between Dec. 21 and Dec. 25 coincided with the arrival of two new girls just before Christmas.

"Be that as it may, at no time were any residents in any danger whatsoever," Leitstein said.

Residents disagree. In a letter to the township, neighbor Bill Szfranski said police reports indicate otherwise.

"There have been acts of violence, an attempted suicide and the need for multiple trained adults to deal with individual residents," he wrote. "The staff has verbally admitted to the police that the actions of some of the residents are 'uncontrollable.' There is no way that anyone can reasonably say that the occupants of that home are safe or that my children (or others in the neighborhood) are safe to be outside in their own yard or home for that matter."

While municipalities have no legal jurisdiction over group homes, residents asked the township to lead them in petitioning the state to pull the home's license.

Leitstein said township officials asked to meet with him this week to discuss neighbors' concerns. He has agreed but says he's confident that there's no danger that the state will yank his license.

"We haven't done anything contrary to licensing standards," he said.

He said the residents are simply watching the house like hawks to find reasons to complain. They've been against the idea of a group home there since before the first teen moved in, he said.

"This is an elitist response from a discriminatory group of people who made it clear from the start that this is exactly what they were going to do," he said. "This is a small group of people who don't have compassion or understanding for the girls we work with and we hope that changes."

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