The empty lot at the corner of Willow and Light streets in New Richmond is slowly transforming. A stone labyrinth swirls across ground once littered with trash. Tufts of small green native plants meant to attract butterflies dot the perimeter, with space for more later.
It's home to a new butterfly garden that will be maintained by staff and residents of two local addiction recovery houses — a way for them to find peace and strengthen their ties to the community during their recovery journey.
Rebirth means multiple things at this intersection. Nestled next to the restless Ohio River, New Richmond has always struggled with an ancient cycle: Flood. Recovery. Flood. Recovery. There was an enormous one in 1937. Another in 1996. And another just a year later in 1997.
As people gather to dedicate the garden on a recent drizzly Sunday, Anita Lenhardt recalls that flood. She points across the street.
"I actually grew up down there on that corner," she says. "There's nothing there now. The flood in 1997 just ruined all my family's property."
The 1997 flood destroyed 40 homes and damaged 395 others. The new garden once held one of them. The June 10, 1997 edition of the Cincinnati Enquirer says water from the March flood filled the first floor of the light blue house owned by 70-year-old Edna Hadley and built by her late husband 46 years prior. The city later purchased the property and dozens of others with FEMA funds for greenspace conversion.
"We've cleaned up after floods before," local business owner Lee Ann Hodges told the paper back then. "If it happens again, we'll clean it up again."
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Gardening as an act of recovery
The flood isn't Lenhardt's only connection to this place. She works for On Our Way Home, the nonprofit partnering with the village on the garden. It runs a men's recovery house just down the street, where Lenhardt works. She lives in the organization's women's recovery home in Bethel. Like other residents, she's volunteered to help tend the garden.
Her own journey through addiction started 15 years ago with a back injury and a prescription for pain medication.
"I had everything a person could want," she says. "And then that first pill that I took, that was my whole life after that."
Lenhardt is currently going to school to counsel others overcoming addiction. The symbolism of butterflies — their start as caterpillars, their retreat into a cocoon, their re-emergence — resonates with her.
"I think about that, the way that you change into something beautiful, something that you were always meant to be," she says.
New Richmond Village Administrator Kathryn Bailey says the land has undergone its transformation thanks to a grant the village and Clermont County worked together on.
"This was just a junkyard," she says. "Literally. We had to get the trash removed. We took out old cars."
The village wants to connect the land to other lots converted to greenspace. The next goal: a bird sanctuary nearby.
"I think what it stands for is a beautiful thing," Bailey says. "Rebirth."
Beauty after hardship
As Bailey explains the cleanup efforts, people file in for a ceremony introducing the garden.
Gary Cunningham has been an enthusiastic guide all morning for anyone interested in the space.
"Hey you guys want to come on up? Come on in, we'll check it out," he tells people around the edges of the park as the ceremony begins.
Cunningham lives just down the street at On Our Way Home's men's recovery center and works at a nearby restaurant. Like Lenhardt, he's one of the residents who will help maintain the garden.
Cunningham says the recovery house is essential for him. His struggles with substance abuse that started with alcohol and then grew to include hard drugs. He was facing homelessness when his former counselor, Emily Stoll, helped him get into the New Richmond house.
Stoll, who has herself struggled with addiction, is now On Our Way Home's director of support. She's leading the opening ceremony for the garden. First, there's a meditative walk around the labyrinth and pictures to take in the new park.
The morning's steady drizzle tappers off just as Stoll gives a brief speech about hardship and struggle, resilience and growth. It's meant to reflect on the individual journeys people in recovery must travel, but its watery theme resonates with the village's periodic rebirth after flooding, too.
"Rain, though sometimes seen as an inconvenience, is truly a gift," she says. "Just like the challenges we face in life, it can bring growth and renewal. The rain that has fallen today will help this garden bloom and flourish. It's a reminder that beauty often emerges from moments of hardship."
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To cap it all off, Stoll, Cunningham and others hand out small envelopes to attendees. They contain live butterflies. The crowd of a few dozen releases them all at once. There are gasps and cheers as the butterflies emerge, filling the air with flashes of orange.
Reconnecting to community
Stoll says she hopes the transformation of this lot into a garden and its upkeep will help residents in addiction recovery feel like they're a bigger part of the village.
"There's a lot of isolation in recovery because of guilt, shame and embarrassment and just barriers brought by our society," she says. "But people can heal through community and relationship with others. This butterfly garden will give our residents this chance to be more involved in the community."
That's something Cunningham is enthusiastic about.
"How can I put this? Having a purpose, being able to go over there and take care of it knowing it's ours," he says.
An earlier version of this story misidentified the kinds of butterflies released. The error has been corrected.