In the News
The Salt Lake Tribune reported Thursday on accounts from seven former participants and recovery advocates describing harsh treatment by The Other Side Academy after they left, noting that about 40% of participants complete the program. Co-founder Joseph Grenny responded on the Politicit Podcast, arguing that Utah should stop funding any program that will not publish how many people come through its doors and how many are drug-free, crime-free, and employed years later.
Here’s Our Take
Grenny is right. The 40% the Tribune reported is a completion rate the Academy publishes itself, and the reporters ran it as a mark against the program. But it says nothing about whether the program works. The numbers that matter come later. The Academy tracks how many of its people are still drug-free, crime-free, and employed five years out, and reports the whole range: 21% of everyone accepted, 59% of those who finish the two-and-a-half-year program, and 94% of those who stay on afterward. All of it is based on self-reported data. No other program or provider in Utah has anything comparable to report, if they publish anything at all. The state’s substance use scorecard measures sobriety, housing, employment, and arrests on the day a client leaves a clinical treatment facility, and the counting stops there. Renaissance Ranch, one of the few Utah providers with a public outcomes page, says as much on its own site. “Long-term, post-treatment measurement is still growing across the whole industry.” Utah appropriated more than $675 million for behavioral health services in fiscal 2027 without that measurement.
Closing
Utah already collects the right measures, but it stops at discharge. Libertas Institute is exploring whether the state should require those same measures at six and twelve months, reported by provider, for anyone taking public money. Completion is not recovery, and Utahns paying for these programs deserve to know the difference.
