September 2nd, 2009
Iowa to Close a Kirkbride?
One of Iowa’s four state psychiatric hospitals will be shut down according to an article in the Sioux City Journal: State May Close Mental Health Facility. This means yet another Kirkbride may be abandoned in the not too distant future, unless the facility at Mount Pleasant is the one that gets closed. The Kirkbride there, of course, being long gone. I really hope Cherokee, Clarinda and Independence get to hang on. It would be a shame to see any of them abandoned after all these years.
Surely they won’t close Clarinda!
I hope not. I hope they don’t close any really, but if I was forced to guess I’d say Independence would be the one to be shut down. Cherokee and Clarinda seem like more multi-purpose institutions and therefore more sustainable. But that’s just a total guess and I can’t say that I know much about the current state of Mount Pleasant.
Wow… if they were to close Cherokee down, I hope there’d be some plan for reusing the Kirkbride in another way… the problem is, in Iowa, these Kirkbrides are located in smaller communities which would have no real other use for such a massive structure…
In case anyone reads my comment above and thinks it’s a definitive statement, this article: State Looks to Close One of Four mental Health Institutions in Iowa says that Independence is in fact currently the largest facility in terms of patient beds with 95. Mount Pleasant is second with 79, Cherokee is third with 58, and Clarinda is last with 55 beds. So my observation was at least somewhat incorrect if not totally wrong. Sorry.
Hi Guys! I work at Independence. At this point they are saying they will close Mount Pleasant and Clarinda. Moving most of the patients to Independence. Because Independence has room and it is in the best shape. Mount Pleasant and Clarinda both are currently mostly occupied by Department of Corrections. They will take over the space the mental patients are in. By doing this all 4 will continued to be maintained.
Thanks for the update, MJC. This article seems to back what you say up, although it doesn’t say much about Clarinda: Proposal: Close MHI at Mount Pleasant, Move Service to Independence
This chain has dropped off. However, as of 8-16-2012 none of the above mentioned locations in Iowa have been closed. Furthermore no further talks have taken place of closing any of the locations “at the moment”.