Treatment Abuse, Behavior Modification, Thought Reform > The Ridge Creek School / Hidden Lake Academy

When is HLA finally going to close???

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TheWho:
Guest wrote:

--- Quote --- Note to "The Who": Why are you bringing up Aspen? Is that because Aspen is considering buying HLA? That's been rumored. Maybe you're just confirming it.
--- End quote ---


No, nothing I heard directly, but I do have some thoughts on the subject?.. they have a small place called ?Stone Mountain school? down that way but very little else in the southeast, well maybe "New Leaf", but they are doing well focusing on 10-12 year old girls and wouldn?t want to break the integrity there.  Stone Mountain needs lots of work and is more of a wilderness program (with a few buildings) than anything else.  Strategically it makes sense if they could pick up the HLA property, sell off some land to pay back taxes on it, throw on a coat of paint etc. they could implement a more of a clinical based program modeled after ASR, maybe call it ?Wahsega Academy? and either sell off the Stone mountain school or use it as the wilderness portion (depending on SUWS capacity and expansion).  They cant keep building and expanding in Cummington because they will lose their small school atmosphere and the new direction is ?specialize and focus on a specific problems? which would allow them more freedom to do this if some kids went to Georgia.  This would also solve their growing pain problems.  Although any success would be hinged on a relationship with the Lumpkin school district and whether this guy Dewey Moye (who is also on the board of the Georgia Accrediting Commission)  would extend his hand to Aspen for an academic certification partnership etc.  Without the academics portion (or as a minimum a non-traditional ed status, special purpose or a provisional accreditation) they won?t consider it in my opinion?..So it is just speculation as a possibility on my part, no rumor confirmation.

RobertBruce:
It appears the citizens of Dahlonega have had enough, they shot down the tax abatement for Mountain Brook because they didnt want another program in their area. I doubt that would do anything to welcome another program swooping in after HLA is gone. They just dont appear to want it.

TheWho:

--- Quote from: ""RobertBruce"" ---It appears the citizens of Dahlonega have had enough, they shot down the tax abatement for Mountain Brook because they didnt want another program in their area. I doubt that would do anything to welcome another program swooping in after HLA is gone. They just dont appear to want it.
--- End quote ---


What you say may be true, but, I saw it a little differently.  It seems the people of Dahlonega were a little disenchanted because HLA was looking for financial help from the town in the form of an abatement when HLA didn?t seem to want to be part of the community.  It seems they were not doing enough to hire local people and basically give back to the community, so why should the town give them a loan?

If another company came along and offered to contribute more to the town in the form of hiring local people, paying taxes and able to pull their own weight financially they may be better received.

Deborah:
You clearly are not informed, as usual.

TheWho:

--- Quote from: ""Deborah"" ---You clearly are not informed, as usual.
--- End quote ---


Here is where I got my information:

Hidden Lake Academy, as reported in one issue of the "Lakeside Reflections", the school paper, has been planning to build a sister school which would be called Mountain Brook Academy. HLA requested a somewhat controversial 10-year tax abatement for MBA to the Lumpkin County Board of Commissioners. Many people announced that they were opposed to this including the pastor of the influential local United Methodist Church, Rev. Jeff Ross. Former professor and US Army Colonel Billy Wells, who is in charge of North Georgia College and State University's leadership initiative, was also strongly opposed to the abatement and voiced his concerns in the local paper, The Dahlonega Nugget:
Our property taxes support our children's schools. They support roads like the one the county apparently paved for you at Hidden Lake. If you are so interested in giving, then why can you not give your fair share of taxes like everyone else? Are the children of Lumpkin County not important to you...The public deserves some clear answers ... not Madison Avenue ads, spin and pressure tactics.
As far as providing jobs for current residents, an analysis of your Web site indicates that 60 percent of your academically-credentialed staff, those who make the best salaries, originally came from out of state. Probably even more came from out of the county. Also, do you plan to construct additional faculty housing so employees do not have to pay property taxes? I suspect you will create jobs ... and then bring in the people to fill them

So it doesn?t seem to be the school per se, based on this article anyway.  I am sure there is more to the story but the people seemed to feel HLA was not a good neighbor and wasn?t supporting the community.

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