CARLSBAD: Autism school returns some parents' checks

Others say they still haven't been reimbursed

By BARBARA HENRY - Staff Writer | Friday, October 3, 2008 10:52 PM PDT ∞

CARLSBAD ---- Some of the parents who paid tuition to an as-yet unopened private school for autistic children in Carlsbad have recently gotten their money back, but others said they are still waiting for their checks.

In late August, the school announced that families who filed written requests would have their tuition payments refunded within the next month.

"I'm really frustrated because they never said it would be longer than ... 30 days" for the reimbursement, Encinitas parent Nora Middleton said Thursday.

Middleton said she paid $4,000 to reserve a spot for her 5-year-old son in June and asked for her money back, along with other parents, in mid-August when school officials said there was no chance that the proposed National Center for Autism Research and Education could open this fall as planned.

She said all she's heard since is a series of stalling tactics from school officials. Employees don't return her phone calls, and they keep sending her e-mails asking her to wait just a little longer, Middleton said.

Neither Randy Hickman, one of the proposed school's founders, nor school President Keith Berglund, who has been handling recent media requests, returned phone calls seeking comment this week.

Middleton said Berglund wrote her an e-mail earlier this week telling her that the national economic situation was making it difficult for the school to reimburse the families quickly.

Middleton said she thinks she should have been more aggressive, instead of initially being sympathetic in August when she requested her refund. Two parents who demanded that the school return their deposits and took their case to the news media have received reimbursement.

"We got ours within a couple of days of what they said, so I was totally amazed," said Becky Crane, a Vista resident with an 8-year-old son who was planning to attend the school.

Julie Balke, who has a 5-year-old son who would have attended the school, also said Thursday that she received her check in mid-September.

Plans to open the school were announced last spring. School officials said the place would offer both traditional classroom work and the many therapy services that some autistic children require. Tuition was proposed to be $50,000 a year, but parents were told that scholarships would be available.

Autism is a developmental disability that is usually diagnosed in children when they are about 3. Children with autism have trouble communicating and interacting with others. They typically have a reduced sensitivity to pain, but are extremely sensitive to noises and touch. A wide range of therapies are used to help them.

In August, Berglund said the school hadn't gotten anywhere near the enrollment it needed to open and that's why the project was delayed. The school's Web site stated that school leaders had trouble finding a site that the city would allow them to use, and that local public schools opposed the project.

The parents of prospective students became increasingly frantic when the school's offices were vacated in August. A landlord who was renting the school space evicted the school, saying its leaders were roughly $80,000 behind in their rent payments. School officials have since moved to new office space within the city's business park region.

The old landlord isn't the only businessman who has come forward saying school leaders owe him money. A planning consultant said Thursday that he has long since given up on being paid for his work on the project.

Enrique Medina, president of Alliance Consulting International of San Diego, said he billed the center for $3,000 worth of consulting work last year and hasn't received a dime. He said he considered taking the issue to small claims court, but had trouble identifying who to sue because school officials appeared not to have filed state incorporation paperwork or federal tax-exempt status paperwork.

An official with the state attorney general's office said last month that her office had no record of a National Center for Autism Research and Education on file as a nonprofit corporation.

Contact staff writer Barbara Henry at (760) 901-4072 or bhenry@nctimes.com.

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