Newport Academy Cuts 68 Jobs at St. Cloud Teen Treatment Center

Newport Academy has permanently laid off 68 workers at its teen mental health and substance use treatment center in south St. Cloud, Minnesota, with the cuts taking effect September 30 and October 1, according to a federal WARN notice.

The company, registered as Monroe Operations, LLC, doing business as Newport Healthcare, notified the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development's State Rapid Response Team late Thursday afternoon. The notice does not give a reason for the layoffs.

The eliminated positions span the entire operation at the facility at 1726 7th Avenue South. Clinical roles cut include nurse practitioners, licensed practical nurses, therapists, art therapists, licensed alcohol and drug counselors and behavioral health specialists. The layoffs also removed the residential program director, overnight and residential supervisors, the operations manager, teachers, a sous chef, housekeepers and security guards. None of the affected workers belong to a union.

What the cuts signal about the company's direction

For workers in Minnesota's behavioral health sector, the move fits a broader pattern at Newport. The Nashville-based company, majority-owned by Canadian private equity firm Onex, closed nine residential facilities in California and Virginia a year ago as part of a companywide restructuring. At that time, Newport said it planned to focus growth on Minnesota, Connecticut, Massachusetts and Utah. The St. Cloud layoffs now put that stated Minnesota commitment in question, and the WARN notice's silence on causes leaves affected employees without an official explanation for the closure-level scope of the cuts.

At 68 positions eliminated at once, the action ranks among the larger single-site layoffs in the St. Cloud labor market. For the displaced workers — clinicians, counselors, teachers and support staff — the job search starts immediately in a regional market where youth mental health and substance use treatment roles exist primarily through hospital systems and competing residential providers. Affected workers can access reemployment services through the state's Dislocated Worker Program.

A site with nearly a century of child-care history

The campus at 1726 7th Avenue South has served children for almost 100 years. Bishop Joseph Busch of the Diocese of St. Cloud founded the St. Cloud Children's Home there as an orphanage in 1924, and the Franciscan Sisters of Little Falls cared for orphaned children on the property for more than 40 years. In the mid-1960s, Catholic Charities converted it into a residential treatment center for youth, which operated until 2017. The building also housed District 742's Riverwoods program.

The diocese sold the roughly 40-acre property in fall 2020 as part of a $22.5 million trust established to compensate survivors of clergy sexual abuse. The buyer, Minnesota Health Real Estate Holdings of Irvine, California, paid about $5.4 million and turned control over to Newport, which planned a 60-bed residential center serving 30 boys and 30 girls struggling with mental health issues.

Those plans hit a setback on April 7, 2021, when fire broke out in one of the main buildings during renovations. The St. Cloud fire marshal identified two points of origin, but the building was too badly damaged for a full investigation, and the cause was never determined.

In January 2022, the diocese and the city dedicated a historical marker along the Beaver Island Trail honoring the Children's Home and its nearly century of service to young people.

With the WARN notice offering no rationale and Newport's parent restructuring across multiple states, further facility-level decisions from the company are likely to shape the Upper Midwest behavioral health employment picture in the months ahead.