Four employees at the state-run Mental Health Institutes in Clarinda and Mount Pleasant testified before the Iowa Senate Oversight Committee Wednesday, disputing the governor’s assertion that their facilities are antiquated. Sue Rehwaldt Hays is an occupational therapist who has worked at the Clarinda M-H-I since 1984. She says, just like the Iowa statehouse, the facility in Clarinda has been updated with recent renovations like new windows, new furniture and a fire alarm system that’s still being installed.

Anna Short worked as a drug abuse counselor at the Mount Pleasant M-H-I until last week. Many of her former patients who’ve made a success of their lives after treatment there called after learning the place was closing.

Short says the facility was actually built in the 1960s and, in the past year, it got brand new, specially-made furniture that was bolted to the floor in the psych ward; a new, million dollar elevator and a new security system.

The Branstad Administration’s plan is to close the two mental health institutes in southern Iowa, but keep the M-H-I’s in Cherokee and Independence open. A spokesman for the agency in charge says there will be 30 MORE beds available after July 1st for in-patient treatment of acutely mentally ill patients in the two facilities than had been available when all four Mental Health Institutes were operating at full capacity.