OCEANSIDE -- A small uproar over a proposed group home in Bressi Ranch may sound familiar to residents of two neighborhoods in La Costa and Oceanside, where similar homes have opened, but those programs have caused no problems, city officials and residents said last week.

When the nonprofit agency TERI Inc. bought a house five years ago in Oceanside's River Pointe community, rumors rapidly circulated that the place would be a halfway house for people with serious substance abuse issues, said Mike Meysenburg, president of the neighborhood's homeowners association.

But once the home's occupants -- six young men with autism and other brain disorders -- started moving in, everything calmed down, he added.

"I don't think anybody in our association has a negative assessment toward them," Meysenburg said last week.

He lives five houses away from the group home and said he has never had a noise complaint about the place; has never seen its occupants out wandering on their own; and finds the property to be very well-maintained.

TERI Inc. expects to open a similar group home soon on Alverton Drive in Bressi Ranch, a relatively new, upscale community west of El Camino Real and north of Palomar Airport Road.

The home, which will be the organization's 10th in North County, will house four "highly functioning" young men with autism or other brain disorders, officials with TERI have said.

Two or three staffers also typically oversee residents at TERI homes.

But some Bressi Ranch residents oppose the plan and have been trying to make their voices heard.

Neighborhood opposition

At least 120 Bressi Ranch property owners held a meeting Monday night to discuss the project.

Several said that their community is not the right place for such a facility.

On Friday, two Alverton Drive residents said TERI bought the home just down the street without telling neighbors what they planned to do with it.

That has made some wary.

"We have no guarantee as to who is going to live there and with what degree of mental illness," said Diana Grogan, who lives a few doors down.

Added neighbor Dana Matas: "We are not confident that what (organizers) say they're going to do is what's going to happen."

Some say the nonprofit ought to buy two less expensive homes elsewhere and get a better value for its $1 million expenditure.

Officials with TERI, which stands for Training, Education & Research Institute, said they are saddened by the Bressi Ranch community's reaction, including comments at Monday's meeting that occupants of the home might be substance abusers or sexual deviants.

That's completely false, said Bill Mara, the organization's chief operating officer.

"Someone out there has created this fear, and it's a fear through ignorance," he said, repeatedly emphasizing that the occupants will be young men such as Matt, who lives at the River Pointe group home.

When visitors arrive at the Oceanside group home, Matt, a 22-year-old resident, makes certain to shake their hands, but struggles with the give and take of standard conversation. (TERI officials asked that Matt's last name not be published.)

A mention that a visitor is from Detroit will set Matt off on a lengthy tangent about how it is very cold there.

Typically, he speaks in a nearly toneless voice, except when he shows off his vast collection of Disney movies.

His favorite? "The Indian in the Cupboard" -- a story of a plastic children's toy that comes alive.

Matt has autism, a brain disorder that can severely affect behavior and ability to communicate.

He can get himself dressed and help do laundry, for example, but he needs a gentle reminder to leave the house when the school bus comes for him.

Learning new behaviors

For Poway resident Mike Lawton, the Oceanside group home has been a godsend.

His 24-year-old son, Evan, lives there.

"TERI saved our life. … There's no other place for these guys to go," said Lawton, who added that the biggest worry parents have is what will happen to their disabled children when the parents die.

Lawton said he and his wife weren't sure Evan, who has metabolic disorder and little language ability, was ready to go when TERI employees offered to move him from the family's home in Poway into the Oceanside group home at age 19.

When he made the move, Evan couldn't dress himself and had obsessive behaviors that made him difficult to take anywhere, his dad said.

Evan used to fall to his hands and knees and stare at electronic door mechanisms whenever he encountered one at a store.

Since his move into the group home, Evan has learned techniques to stop himself from engaging in repetitive behavior, such as endlessly opening and closing doors, Lawton said.

Instead of staring at the electronic door mechanism when he goes to Wal-Mart with his family, he now delights in pushing a grocery cart around the aisles.

Evan has his own friends, his own interests and a safe place to live, no matter what happens to his family, his dad added.

"I sympathize with the neighbors (in Bressi Ranch). I'm sure they just don't know," Lawton said as he described the Oceanside group home. "I just hope the people in Carlsbad would give it a chance."

A perfect spot?

Bressi Ranch residents may not have a choice.

State law bars cities from preventing small group homes with fewer than six residents from opening.

They're considered "family" homes, and cities can't restrict them from certain residential neighborhoods, city officials have said.

Residential areas with sidewalks and lots of community amenities such as stores are the very places where they want to put these group homes, TERI officials said.

Bressi Ranch will be the organization's second group home in Carlsbad.

Officials opened their first group home in Carlsbad's eastern La Costa area nearly three decades ago.

The La Costa home serves six adults in their 40s and 50s who have more profound disabilities than the people at the Oceanside home, Mara said as he gave a tour of both properties Thursday morning.

Some of those residents have lived there ever since a national movement began to shift disabled people out of institutions and into the community, said Cheryl Kilmer, the organization's chief executive officer.

Carlsbad city officials have said recently that they have never had a complaint about the La Costa home in all its years of operation.

Getting a deal

Neither the La Costa group home nor the one in Oceanside's River Pointe neighborhood are as upscale as the lushly landscaped Bressi Ranch property, but the three have many things in common.

They're all on larger lots, with lots of play space in the backyard. They all feature swimming pools. And they're all in walkable residential communities with homeowners associations.

"The house is perfect," Kilmer said of the Bressi Ranch house. "The backyard is fabulous."

She and Mara said the home was picked in part because it is close to shops and volunteer opportunities.

Kilmer said the young men at the group home will be able to work at a senior facility or a Boys & Girls Clubhouse -- both are planned for Bressi Ranch.

While the Bressi Ranch property cost more than the Oceanside group home, it's going to require much less remodeling, they said.

With its renovation price included, the Oceanside house was more than a $1 million expenditure, Kilmer said.

"Actually, we got a deal in Bressi Ranch," Mara said.

Staff write Craig TenBroeck contributed to this report.