Health care cost surge adds to Mass. affordability woes  State House News Service
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“Our plan is to literally blow the socks off of Raleigh,” the owner said.
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
The dance party is about to start in north Raleigh. Expect it to get sweaty.
Jenn Schofield will open Danz Insanity at the beginning of April at 6166 Falls of Neuse Road. The studio will offer dance fitness, trampoline, yoga, strength training, and barre classes. The 2,376-square-foot space has been under construction for the past two months.
“Our plan is to literally blow the socks off of Raleigh,” Schofield said.
Schofield chose the location for its convenience. “It’s easy. We’re about a mile from 540, we’re four miles from North Hills, We are five miles from Wakefield, so we’re pretty centrally located,” she said.
Schofield grew up as a studio dancer and also apprenticed for a ballet company. She danced at the University of Washington and at the University of California Los Angeles. She has choreographed for studios, dance teams and even the halftime show for college football’s Aloha Bowl.
After leaving her dance career behind, Schofield moved around the country working in sales and business development and eventually ended up on the East Coast with her husband, Brant, and their children. On a lark, she joined a dance fitness studio as a stay-at-home mom. Her dance memories came flooding back and she realized how much she enjoyed the format.
“I had no idea that anything like that existed,” she said.
When the family landed in Raleigh, Schofield created Danz Insanity as her own dance/cardio workout brand. After four years in business, Danz Insanity has produced more than 100 on-demand video classes, with memberships that cost $29.95. Schofield has also led classes at Life Time fitness.
Getting her own storefront is the next step for growing her following and business.
Jeremy Deckelbaum with Elm Partners represented Danz Insanity in its lease.
At the studio, guests will have heart rate monitors that will display metrics on TVs. “It’s going to look a bit like a nightclub, with a disco ball and all theatrical lighting” plus metrics from the heart monitors on display, she said.
While some classes will be dance-focused, the studio is also getting 20 mini-trampolines. The trampoline classes will focus on the joints and also help with lymphatic system drainage, endurance and strength-building, according to Schofield.
“I’ve had five knee surgeries myself. I’m like the Lindsey Vonn of dance fitness. So if I can get behind a tramp workout, and the exercise science of it and the safety of it, it does its job and it’s safe,” she said.
Schofield plans to have 10 people on staff, including herself.
She’s licensed more than 70 pieces of music to play during classes. With the brick-and-mortar space, Schofield will also be able to start live streaming classes.
“I’m trying to create a dance party,” she said.
So far, the studio has nabbed 12 of its 65 pre-sale monthly memberships that cost $139.
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by ALEXX ALTMAN-DEVILBISS | The National News Desk
TOPICS:
BLAIR COUNTY, Pa. (TNND) — The Pennsylvania lawyer representing suspected UnitedHealthcare CEO killer Luigi Mangione is seeking to dismiss the criminal charges he faces in the state.
The 26-year-old is accused of gunning down CEO Brian Thompson near a Midtown Manhattan hotel on Dec. 4 and leading police on a five-day manhunt where he was arrested at a McDonald's in Altoona.
He faces charges of possessing an unlicensed firearm, forgery and providing false identification.
Attorney Thomas Dickey argued in a court filing reviewed by The Independentthat the charges he faces should be dismissed because they were based on evidence "received as a fruit of an illegal stop, seizure, detention, and/or arrest."

Dickey also claims Mangione was not positively identified as the suspect until after he was arrested.
Police had "no paperwork, photograph, warrant, communication, or other information in its possession corroborating the speculation that Defendant was in fact the person being sought in New York,” according to the filing.
In February, Dickey filed a motion to suppress evidence, search warrants, statements made at his arraignment, as well as the reference to his "manifesto" claiming that Altoona police violated his rights and illegally detained him.
In the 23-page court filing, Dickey alleges that police "cornered" Mangione inside the restaurant and would not allow him to leave under his own merit, never told him he was "free to go" and reportedly provided "no explanation" for the encounter other than he "looked suspicious."
The attorney further alleges that officers continued to illegally question Mangione inside the restaurant and conducted an illegal "pat down" while not reading him his Miranda Rights for 15 minutes.
Police also searched his belongings, including his backpack, without a valid warrant, Dickey argued. A 9pmm handgun, a mechanized upper receiver, a suspected 3D-printed suppressor, handwritten notes and a red notebook were found.

Nearly two weeks after his initial arrest, Mangione waived his preliminary hearing in the case and was extradited to New York, where he is facing both state and federal charges. He pleaded not guilty to murder and terror charges in New York.
An unsealed federal complaint also charges him with two counts of stalking and one count each of murder through use of a firearm and a firearms offense. He has yet to make a plea.
Karen Friedman Agnifilo, the attorney representing him in New York, has also said she believes there were search and seizure violations during his Pennsylvania arrest.

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The Colorado Sun
Telling stories that matter in a dynamic, evolving state.
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Nearly 500 behavioral health workers — nurses, therapists and cleaning staff — lost their jobs so far this year with a psychiatric hospital move and two hospital closures. 
West Springs Hospital in Grand Junction, West Pines in Wheat Ridge and Johnstown Heights Behavioral Health have announced massive layoffs since January, causing behavioral health jobs to disappear as the state has worked for years to build a more robust mental health care system. 
West Springs, which operated on the Western Slope for 20 years and was the only inpatient psychiatric hospital in western Colorado, discharged its final patient Monday after announcing three weeks ago that it was shutting its doors. It closed its psychiatric emergency department the same day. 
While the hospital is no more, the affiliated Mind Springs Health will continue its outpatient mental health services, which include therapy for adults, children and families, as well as substance abuse treatment. 
The Grand Junction hospital notified the Colorado Department of Labor on Feb. 24 that it was laying off all 187 employees. Hospital officials said they failed to provide 60 days’ notice of the closure because they had been “actively seeking capital or business” that would have allowed the hospital to stay open or at least postpone closure.  
But the financial rescue did not come through, they said.
“Unfortunately, West Springs Hospital was unable to secure the capital needed to avoid closure, and this notice is being provided as soon as practicable after this conclusion was reached,” said the letter, sent as a requirement of the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act.
The 48-bed hospital was operating at a loss, with only about 30 beds filled on average over the past six years, and had come under intense scrutiny in recent years over patient care. The hospital opened in 2005, and in 2016 built a new $34 million facility funded partly from donations and grants, including from the Colorado Health Foundation.
“It is with a heavy heart that we announce the upcoming closure of West Springs Hospital,” hospital officials said in a news release announcing the closure. “This decision was not made lightly, and we understand the profound impact it will have on our patients, staff, and community.”
Vincent Atchity, president of Mental Health Colorado, called the closure a “disaster for the health needs of the people of the Western Slope.”
“Mind Springs has been a disaster for years,” he said. “It’s an underserved population and their access to care issues are going to increase.” 
In northern Colorado, two behavioral health hospitals are shutting down. 

Johnstown Heights is laying off all 158 employees, its leaders said in a letter to the labor department. That includes dozens of nurses and about 60 behavioral health workers and therapists.
In a letter to the community of Larimer County, hospital officials said it took “pride in the lives we have touched.” 
“Mental health is a personal journey, and we are honored to have walked alongside so many,” the letter said. “As we close our doors, we remain hopeful that the compassion and commitment we have fostered will continue, and we encourage individuals to seek other available resources in their journey.”
The 92-bed Johnstown hospital had come under regulatory scrutiny in past years and had shut down and reopened under a new name in 2021.
And in Jefferson County, the 96-bed West Pines Behavioral Health in Wheat Ridge is laying off 132 workers, though some are likely to be rehired at a new location. Operations at the hospital are set to end March 31 as it moves to a new facility in nearby Westminster. 
The hospital, owned by Intermountain Health, is shutting down as Intermountain and Acadia HealthCare open the new 144-bed behavioral health hospital. In its notice to the state labor department about the layoffs, Intermountain officials said employees in Wheat Ridge will have the opportunity to apply for jobs with Acadia.
The new Westminster hospital will help maintain behavioral health jobs in northwest Denver, but the closures of the other two psychiatric hospitals in Grand Junction and Johnstown are “terrible for their patients, their employees and their communities,” said Cara Welch with the Colorado Hospital Association. 
“We know that our state needs more behavioral health resources and support, not less,” she said via email. “It is certain that some patients will feel the immediate impact – either having to travel further for their care or wait longer to access the care they need.”
Until recently, Colorado hadn’t had a hospital closure since the 1980s, Welch said. The recent closures are due to the “financial headwinds” of the pandemic, a decrease in Medicaid enrollment and “increasingly burdensome state and federal regulations,” she said. 
“It all added up to be too much for these two facilities to withstand,” Welch said.
The hospital layoffs come after rounds of layoffs in 2024 at Colorado’s community mental health centers. The job cuts included positions at WellPower, which provides mental health care in Denver regardless of whether patients have insurance, and Jefferson Center, which serves Jefferson, Clear Creek and Gilpin counties. 
Others included Larimer County’s community mental health center, SummitStone Health Partners in Fort Collins, which abruptly laid off 75 employees last summer, Mind Springs in Grand Junction and Centennial Mental Health, which serves 10 counties in the northeastern corner of the state.
The community mental health centers and the hospitals blamed a drop in the number of Coloradans insured by Medicaid. Enrollment in the government health insurance program was cut after rising dramatically during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The state has been dealing for years with a shortage of mental health care workers, and lawmakers have poured millions of dollars into increasing the number of workers and access to care. 
The Colorado Behavioral Health Administration, which is trying to create a comprehensive tally of mental health jobs statewide, said it is working with communities to add new services, including high-intensity in-patient care and outpatient therapy. Examples that fill community need include a new 28-bed in-patient treatment center in the Vail Valley. 
“The closures of the West Springs, West Pines and Johnstown Hospitals have created significant changes in the behavioral health care workforce in the communities that they served,” said administration spokesperson Allie Eliot. “In light of those changes, BHA wants to assure the community that providing easy access to high-quality behavioral health services remains a top priority.”
Based on facts, either observed and verified directly by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources.
Jennifer Brown writes about mental health, the child welfare system, the disability community and homelessness for The Colorado Sun. As a former Montana 4-H kid, she also loves writing about agriculture and ranching. Brown previously worked… More by Jennifer Brown
The Colorado Sun is an award-winning news outlet based in Denver that strives to cover all of Colorado so that our state — our community — can better understand itself. The Colorado Sun is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. EIN: 36-5082144
(720) 263-2338
Got a story tip? Drop us a note at tips@coloradosun.com

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Pete Hegseth Orders ‘Rapid’ Review of Military Fitness: What We Know  Newsweek
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