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Spring Creek at the helm
July 5, 2007
John S. Adams
Forget about the fox guarding the
henhouse. In the case of the Montana Board of Private Alternative
Adolescent Residential or Outdoor Programs (PAARP), the fox is now
running the whole rent-a-cop shop.
On June 21 Spring Creek Lodge
Principal Mickey Manning was elected to head the PAARP board, which
is in the process of developing new licensing regulations for the
state’s troubled teen industry. The five-member board—which has been
under the scrutiny of critics and watchdogs since it was created by
the 2005 Legislature—is made up of three members from the teen-help
industry and two members of the general public. At the board’s last
meeting, three of those members voted to choose a top official from
the state’s most notorious teen program to run the board (one member
didn’t vote and another was absent). Spring Creek is currently
involved in multiple lawsuits, including a wrongful death suit over
a 2004 suicide at the school. Many observers point to Spring Creek
as the catalyst for the state’s push to license these programs in
the first place.
“I’m shocked that she would be the
one that the board would choose,” said Isabelle Zehnder, a child
advocate and founder of the Coalition Against Institutionalized
Child Abuse. “I feel that with all the publicity about WWASPS [World
Wide Association of Specialty Programs and Schools—the Utah-based
organization that was the longtime parent of Spring Creek] in the
media and the lawsuits that are going on right now…when there’s
smoke there’s fire.”
In 2005, then-Rep. Paul Clark, who
owns and operates a residential teen program in Sanders County,
carried legislation that created the PAARP board and mandated its
3–2 makeup. The term-limited Clark then got himself appointed to the
board and took the reins as chairman. After more than a year of
examining the benefits of licensure, the board delivered no solid
recommendations for licensure or anything else prior to the 2007
session, during which lawmakers went ahead and required licensure
anyway, tasking the board with development of licensing rules.
Now, with Manning at the helm, the
board will spend the next few months developing those rules. The
board’s been given a deadline of Oct. 1, 2008. Apparently there’s no
hurry.
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