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The N.C. Department of Corrections is developing a proposal for a private contractor to take over medical care and mental health treatment for inmates.

DOC posted a request for proposals from private care providers early last year, but withdrew from the plan after officials found none of the responses acceptable. DOC spokesman Keith Acree said this week that the agency is in the process of developing a new RFP, but that it would likely be "a few months before a new one is finalized and posted."

Last month, the state Department of Health and Human Services issued a call for companies interested in taking over the care of about 90 patients with mental illness accused of crimes or found not guilty by reason of insanity. With more than 40,000 inmates currently incarcerated in the state prison system, the DOC proposal would potentially be much larger.

The state has a checkered history with privatization efforts. Two prisons operated by a private company contracted by DOC had to be taken back over by the state in 2000 due to serious problems at the facilities.

The state branch of the NAACP has added its voice to the chorus of groups expressing opposition to the pending closure of Dorothea Dix Hospital.

Plans call for the Raleigh hospital to stop accepting new patients within weeks, with most of the remaining patients being discharged or transferred to other state facilities by the end of the year. The oldest of the state's four state psychiatric hospitals, Dix has been in continuous operation since 1856. 

In a written news release, the NAACP predicted that many patients, most of whom the group said are black and poor, will be scattered in homeless shelters, on the streets or in jail as winter approaches. The treatment of the workers at Dix who are losing their jobs in the midst of a recession, most of whom are minorities, is equally calloused and inhumane, the group said.

"How a society treats its people who suffer mental illness is a measure of that society," said the Rev. William J. Barber II, president of the state NAACP, according to the release.

Lanier Cansler, the state's secretary of Health and Human Services, has said Dix must close due to budget constraints. Several groups, including the Wake chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, held a march in downtown Raleigh last month to protest the closure plan.

A coalition of groups hand-delivered a letter to the office of Gov. Bev Perdue Wednesday urging her not to close Dorothea Dix Hospital.

The letter — signed as representing the members of the Wake County Chapter of the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, the N.C. Public Service Workers Union and other groups — expressed dismay at plans to largely shut down the Raleigh psychiatric hospital by the end of the year, even as the state's mental health system remains in crisis.

The letter lists five primary concerns:

• Fifty percent of state psychiatric beds have been closed since the reform plan of 2001 and the central region of the state lacks sufficient community-based mental health services.
• State hospital beds are needed to provide specialized, long-term care not available elsewhere.
• Wait times for admissions and services for people with mental illness are already unacceptably long.
• During the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, the state is not offering unemployment or Reduction-in-Force benefits (severance pay, extension of health care, etc.) to hundreds of Dix workers losing their jobs.
• If Dix closes, the homeless, unemployed and incarcerated populations will increase.

The groups ask Perdue to schedule a town hall-style forum to discuss the future of Dix by Nov. 1.

All but a handful of patients are expected to be transfered from Dix to state hospitals in Butner and Goldsboro by Dec. 31. Last week, 47 long-term patients signed a petition asking to remain at Dix. 

A request for comment from Perdue's office has not yet received a response.

Lanier Cansler, the secretary of Health and Human Services, said he has received numerous letters, telephone calls and voiced concerns about the future of Dix

"I can certainly understand the interest and strong feelings associated with any changes to the Dix campus," Cansler said in a written statement. "However, it is not by choice that funding is not available, and the state's budget does not provide resources to continue to operate the facility as it has been operated in the past. But it is a reality that we must accept."

Long-term patients from Dorothea Dix Hospital in Raleigh have signed a petition to protest the pending shutdown of most of the facility's operations.

The petition, signed by 47 patients, says they are concerned about the move to a new hospital in Butner to which most of those at Dix are to be relocated by the end of the year.

"We feel that our rights will be violated because we have a lot of privileges here at Dix and if we move we feel that the management at Central Regional Hospital will take away all of the privileges," says the petition. "We feel that we are being treated fairly here at Dix. ... Keep Dix open."

Opened in 1856, Dix's closure has long been planned under a mental health reform plan passed in 2001 that would take the number of state mental hospitals from four to three, with new replacement hospitals in Butner, Goldsboro and Morganton.

Gov. Bev. Perdue will be in Goldsboro next Friday for a groundbreaking ceremony for the planned new Cherry Hospital, which will replace the aging existing facility nearby. The new hospital is expected to be fully open by March 2013, with 316 inpatient beds the serve patients from 38 eastern North Carolina counties.

Central Regional Hospital in Butner opened in July 2008 after numerous construction delays and concerns over design flaws with the building that potentially imperiled patients. Construction of a new Broughton Hospital in Morganton is scheduled to begin in the spring.

TRASH RULES: A Superior Court judge upheld the legislature's 2007 restrictions on landfills, rejecting the argument from a large waste company that the law was aimed specifically at its planned Camden County mega dump. Waste Industries sued after lawmakers overhauled landfill laws over worries that large regional dumps could turn North Carolina into one of the nation's biggest trash receptacles. (N&O)

TEA TIME: It's tea time in America. The primary season ends with Tea Party victories in seven GOP Senate races, a handful of Republican gubernatorial contests and dozens of House primary campaigns, and it influenced many others. (AP)

BED SHORTAGE: More than 30 times a day, someone calls Wake County's assessment center for people in need of help with a mental health or substance abuse problem. But a lack of available beds at state hospitals can mean long waits. (N&O)

DNA LAW DIVIDES: The new law requiring DNA samples to be taken from people when they are arrested for certain serious crimes is a major policy shift that has plenty of harsh critics. (N&O)

CENTER TO STAY OPEN: A Charlotte mental health treatment center for adolescents will remain open, despite state regulators' attempt to close it after a series of violent incidents that included the staff hitting patients and a teenager stabbing another child in an eye socket with a rusty nail. (N&O)

POKER ALL IN: The interests behind the video sweepstakes industry believe they have new hope and a new battleground in the wake of Gov. Bev Perdue's suggestion that she's open to legal and regulated video poker. (N&O)

REST HOME DEATHS: In the past two years, at least four residents of North Carolina rest homes have been killed by fellow patients who had histories of severe mental illness and violence.

Those patients might have previously been housed in the government-run mental health facilities that were closed 10 years ago as part of a failed mental health reform plan. (N&O)

CHARLOTTE <3 DNC: National Democratic Party officials dined on steaks and seafood in a restaurant with skyline views. They visited the city's newest amenities. They schmoozed with the mayor, city manager and other movers and shakers.

Party officials must decide whether Charlotte hosts their 2012 national convention. Charlotte officials tried their best Tuesday to persuade them the city has the size, hotel rooms, convention space and restaurants to stage the party's grandest gathering. (Charlotte Observer)

ALCOA MEETING AHEAD: People who want to see Alcoa Inc. lose its license to operate four hydroelectric dams in North Carolina are planning a meeting. (Winston-Salem Journal)

CORRECTION: Post now updates to note that the patient deaths were at REST HOMES, not NURSING HOMES.

RIVALS NO MORE: Ken Lewis, the Chapel Hill lawyer who finished third in the Senate primary, endorsed his former opponent, Elaine Marshall, perhaps delivering African-American votes to her for the June 22 runoff with Cal Cunningham.

INSURANCE SMACKDOWN: Insurance Commissioner Wayne Goodwin called an emergency news conference to fight a special provision in the Senate budget proposal that would strip him of his rate-making authority. The provision was shocking, he said, and happened "in the cover of darkness." Senate leader Marc Basnight said the idea came from his office but ended up in the budget legislation by mistake. The item was later removed.

WISE TO PRIVITIZE?  Two circulating proposals would outsource parts of the state's troubled mental health and probation systems. Lobbyists are pushing privatization, and legislators and state officials are listening. Skeptics say it's a bad idea.

IN OTHER NEWS: Former Department of Transportation Secretary Lyndo Tippett was issued a subpoena in the federal investigation into former Gov. Mike Easley's administration. The Senate budget proposal allows local school systems to furlough teachers. Odd couple: Former Gov. Jim Hunt and "American Idol" finalist Anoop Desai teamed up on a YouTube video to ask people to oppose cuts to the Smart Start early childhood education program.

RUN LIKE A BUSINESS: As North Carolina's leaders struggle to balance its budget, they are considering proposals to outsource parts of the state's troubled mental health and probation systems. (N&O)

COME ON DOWN: A former Southport mayor and a former top aide to former Gov. Mike Easley paid visits Wednesday to the federal building in downtown Raleigh, where a grand jury met. (N&O)

WORKS HARD FOR THE MONEY: Both Democratic Senate candidates Cal Cunningham and Elaine Marshall have had to scrape to find enough money to finance their campaigns. (N&O)