The Free Press, Mankato, MN

Local News

February 4, 2012

Terry Morrow says Regional Treatment Center is still secure

By Tim Krohn Free Press Staff Writer

ST PETER — Local lawmakers tried to reassure St. Peter residents that upheaval within the Regional Treatment Center shouldn’t heighten risk to the community.

And they tried to defend the request by Mankato for millions of dollars of state money to upgrade hockey facilities.

Rep. Terry Morrow, DFL-St. Peter and Sen. Kathy Sheran, DFL-Mankato, touched on those and other topics at a town hall meeting Saturday.

The Treatment Center has been rocked by the resignation or firing of virtually all its psychiatrists and accusations that the center’s new CEO has created hostile working conditions.

“We’ve seen a rise in assaults on staff and patients,” said Morrow, about just one of the problems at the center in recent months and years. He and Sheran said they have been meeting with top state officials and take complaints by staff seriously.

“The big thing I’d like to see is better communication between staff and administration,” Morrow said.

One man, who lives next to the treatment center, said he and his neighbors are worried. “What if there’d be a mass exodus — a worst case scenario? We’re a little scared,” he said of the possibility that violent mentally ill patients getting off the secure campus.

Morrow said the internal turmoil does raise concerns about the care level for patients and the safety of staff, but there’s no reason to believe security of the facility is weakened.

Sheran said the issues need to be resolved for the safety of staff and benefit of parents. “We need to keep that great relationship that the community and the Treatment Center has always had.”

Sheran said the treatment center is a vital institution because of the treatment it offers and for the jobs it provides.

“We’re very attentive to this and will ensure the light stays shining on this,” Sheran said.

The commissioner of the state Human Services Department is scheduled to visit the treatment center this week, Morrow said.

Sheran said the center needs to set specific goals and measure them in areas like  the number of assaults on staff and patients, how often physical or chemical restraints are used, how long patients stay and how often they have to return.

“These are goals we need to track. They will tell us that what we’re doing at ground level is effective.”

Some residents were riled by the inclusion of $14.5 million in Gov. Mark Dayton’s bonding proposal to help pay for a $31 million major upgrade of hockey facilities at the Mankato civic center, as well as adding more convention and meeting space.

“If we’re going to have this shoved down our throats, why does it have to cost $30 million,” asked one resident, who said putting money toward roads would make more sense. Another man asked why the city was putting so much into a hockey facility upgrade for Minnesota State University.

“The unique thing about this arena is it is a partnership between the city and MSU,” Sheran said. If the hockey facilities aren’t kept up, she said, MSU would have to build its own arena.

Morrow said the Mankato community “has come together” on supporting the bonding request and noted the project will also include the addition of more convention and meeting spaces.

He said Mankato is the major regional center of southern Minnesota and that the city has shown it is losing convention and meeting business to other large Minnesota cities and also to Iowa.

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