On Oct. 28, 2019, Grand Peak Academy, a charter school in El Paso County Colorado School District 49, officially opened its doors to students at its new location on Cowpoke Road in Colorado Springs. The school moved from its previous location on Dublin Boulevard, about 3 miles away, after splitting from the Imagine Schools organization in mid-2018, said GPA board president Chris DempseyThe school was formerly known as Imagine Classical Academy and was overseen by the Imagine Schools charter management organization. However, Dempsey said issues with the Dublin Boulevard facility, which is owned by American Education Properties, prompted the GPA board of directors to seek out another facility and to separate from the Imagine organization.ìIt started in 2016,î Dempsey said. ìWe found out that we had some water issues where our northwest parking lot looked like a dump. There were cattails and moss growing. The parking lot was always wet, even when it had not rained or snowed.îEventually, Dempsey said school leaders found out the problem was groundwater seeping onto the property. He said GPA approached the Imagine Schools organization to tell them about the problem and find a way to fix it.ìThey (Imagine Schools) told us that we had a type of lease that allowed us to pay a lower percentage of rent in exchange for taking care of all the work, so we would have to pay for everything (the repairs),î Dempsey said.GPA had been paying $600,000 per year to the Imagine Schools organization with the understanding that Imagine would provide a variety of services, but Dempsey said the school was unable to pinpoint exactly what services the organization provided.A year later, Dempsey said GPA approached Imagine to discuss the different options, specifically to purchase the property so they could break away from any charter management company but retain their facility. American Education Properties, the property owner, asked for $16 million, but GPA had received an appraisal and was told that, with all of the damages to the property, the amount was not reasonable, Dempsey said.ìThere was water damage and foundation damage because of that,î he said. ìThere was cracking to the subfloors and the floors themselves were lifting.îAdditionally, the lease payments on the property rose from just under $1 million per year to $1.3 million between 2008 and 2016, Dempsey said. That amount represented 21 percent of the schoolís annual budget and the per-square-foot cost was higher than just about every other school in the country except for a high-end private school in California, he said.Unable to reach an agreement, Dempsey said GPA made the decision to break away from the Imagine Schools organization and strike out on their own, which meant securing the funding to either purchase a different facility or have one built, he said.The situation dragged on, and individual positions were not guaranteed and there were allegations that Imagine Schools was using the money it received from GPA to supplement failing schools in other states, Dempsey said.With the decision to break away from Imagine officially made, Dempsey said the school approached D 49 to work with their board of education to get permission to move locations, purchase the land for the new facility and renegotiate the charter agreement. In August 2018, GPA broke ground on their new facility, he said.Because the lease required them to make any necessary repairs, GPA put down a $100,000 construction deposit and made a variety of corrections, including replacing the carpet and fixing leaks, Dempsey said. Imagine Schools is keeping about $1,000 of the deposit, he said.ìWe are in the process of getting the rest of the money back,î Dempsey said. ìWe have had no more communication with them and we are operating under the assumption that nothing further is going to happen.îMarisa Preuss, chief communications officer with Imagine Schools National Office, wrote in an email that the following statement was their only comment.ìDespite the school performing well, both academically and financially, the governing board of Imagine Classical Academy at Indigo Ranch decided in late spring 2019 to end its contract with Imagine Schools as CMO (charter management organization). The board has constructed and is operating a new school building in a different location.îDempsey said GPA is happily operating without a charter management organization, and enrollment numbers are up from the 2018-2019 school year.
