Business

Provider completes purchase for rehab facility

Twelve Oaks LLC, a part of Pyramid Healthcare, bought 12-acre site and 10,000-square-foot home on Old Turnpike Road for $2.3 million, land records show.

By Bill Moss, Published: April 3, 2016

MILLS RIVER — A health care company that plans to open a substance-abuse treatment facility has closed on the sale of a 12-acre parcel on Old Turnpike Road in Mills River.

Twelve Oaks LLC, a corporation formed in North Carolina by Pennsylvania-based Pyramid Healthcare Inc., bought the property for $2.3 million last month from Farrell B. and Brenda Kaye Jones of Ormond Beach, Fla. The property, valued for tax purposes at $1.24 million, contains a 10,000-square-foot home valued at $1.16 million.
Mills River Town Manager Jeff Wells said that Pyamid’s North Carolina director of operations, Chad Husted, had told him the company was moving ahead with its plans for a treatment center for men and women who have already gotten sober or been detoxed.
The Mills River Town Council granted Pyramid a special-use permit over the strenuous objections of neighbors in December after a public hearing that stretched over two nights. Council members said state law restricted what they could consider in the way of testimony from residents, who told the board they feared for their safety and predicted that property values would plunge. In its approval of the permit, the Town Council required the health care provider to file a regular update that would report any problems, fully cooperate with law enforcement and “work diligently to ensure safety.” The council also formed a seven-member advisory group that would monitor the facility. It will be made up of representatives of Pyramid, the fire department and the sheriff’s office, a Town Council member, the town manager and two community members — one selected by the council and one selected by Pyramid.
“I think what I’ll do at the next council meeting is mention that it’s closed and we should start looking at the advisory board,” Wells said when a reporter told him of the sale. “We haven’t been approached by them about any sort of permits. I’m sure they’re at the early stages.”
“It sounds like we’ll have to start putting together that advisory committee,” Wells added. “What the council wanted was just a committee that was represented by some citizen leaders as well as town officials and representatives from the business just to make sure that they ingrain themselves in the community and that they’re getting started in the right way and doing things in the right way. I think they were talking about something that would be biannual or at the most quarterly (in terms of meetings). I think it’s mainly just a committee that can keep open communications between the business and the community.”
Pyramid committed to an improvement to the driveway that would make it easier for fire trucks and ambulances to get in and out.
“That’s what we’ll see first,” Wells said. “We’ll see the road and the parking and a site plan for those.”
In the meantime, the company would need a building permit from the county for the renovation and must get a license from the state to operate a treatment facility.
Pyramid’s Hendersonville attorney, Bill Alexander, assured residents that patients at the facility would not be under the influence of drugs or alcohol when they arrive or while they are in treatment.
“Somehow people believe that this is a detoxification facility,” he told the Mills River Town Board. “This is a not a detox facility and will never be a detox facility. It cannot be one under existing law.”
“Individuals must have been detoxified prior to entering into these facilities,” he added, quoting from the state administrative code regulating residential treatment facilities. “Pyramid Healthcare does own and operate a couple of methadone clinics in other states. They are familiar with methadone treatment. That is not what this property is. We could not possibly under a special use permit issued by this board operate a methadone treatment facility. It just cannot be done.”
Pyramid Healthcare is expanding its footprint in Western North Carolina. Last week it acquired Real Recovery in Asheville, a sober living home for men ages 18 to 28. The facility “provides high-quality, personalized care that helps young men develop the life skills and strong sense of community they need to succeed on their path to recovery through participation in positive, sober experiences,” the company said on its website. In Asheville Pyramid also owns October Road Inc., a provider of outpatient addiction and mental health treatment services.