UHD sells adolescent drug treatment facility in Winnebago

WINNEBAGO, Minn. (KEYC) — Finding drug treatment for adolescents just got a little bit more difficult in southern Minnesota as United Hospital District, Inc. has announced the sale of its former Adolescent Treatment Center.

According to UHD, internal use of the building was no longer feasible and the best option was to find a way to keep its use local by selling to Genesis Classical Academy.

UHD CEO Rick Ash says the program had been losing money for years, but the hospital deemed it necessary to keep open. As funding keeps getting cut for the industry and with COVID-19 uncertainties, the facility had to finally make the decision to shut its doors.

“To do good work, unless you’re fortunate enough to have a lot of volunteers, you have to pay people for the profession that they serve in,” explained Ash. “As crude as this may sound, it needs to be paid for, and reasonably. That industry doesn’t have the ability to do some of the cost-shifting that hospitals or the healthcare industry, on the physical side, really can.”

With nearly 10,000 square feet, the former ATC facility in Winnebago was completed in 2010 as the first Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design certified, or 'green' treatment center in the nation.

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