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Steve Roe, executive director of the Beacon of Hope, looks on while standing outside of the entrance to the shelter on Friday. Roe has grown increasingly concerned about mental health care as more people with severe mental illness have been brought to the shelter in recent months.

On a December night in 2021, Steve Roe, of Fort Dodge, was driving home from a grocery store when he saw a zombie-like figure standing in the middle of the road with their arms outstretched.

As he continued north down the road, he saw headlights swerving and cars slamming on their brakes to avoid crashing along North 15th Street.

“It was pitch black and traffic goes fairly fast coming into town near the (Oakland) Cemetery,” recalled Roe, who is the executive director of the Beacon of Hope men’s homeless shelter. “The person was standing in the middle of one of the lanes and leaning forward. They looked like a zombie. His eyes were wide open. His hair was on end.”

Soon, Roe realized he knew the person.

It was someone who was mentally ill that Roe had helped before at the Beacon of Hope, 1021 First Ave. N

So Roe jumped into action.

“I parked my car and got out sprinting,” Roe said. “I grabbed the kid and pulled him out of the lane and dropped down to the ground and started crying. I’m so sick and tired of this. That these people are wandering the streets, killing themselves or hurting others.”

Next, Roe called the Fort Dodge Police Department for assistance.

“The policeman looked at me and said, ‘We have been dealing with this kid for years,’” Roe said. “They said, ‘There’s nothing we can do.'”

So Roe took the person to their home and tried to calm him down through conversation.

“He was manic,” Roe said. “He was out of his head.”

Roe said he doesn’t blame the police for their response.

“The police are right,” Roe said. “There’s nothing out there that is keeping these people locked up because they have the right to walk away. I have made commitments and they walk away. A commitment doesn’t do any good.”

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In another instance, a mentally ill young adult was dropped off at the Beacon by his parents, Roe said.

“When someone drops off a kid here, not only are we expected to try and help them find the resources, but we have now become a babysitting service,” Roe said. “We have had I don’t know how many autistic kids this last year that have been such high maintenance because we have to watch them. They go out on the street. They have the right to go on the street, but it’s not safe. Some of them find weapons.”

Roe runs the shelter with Eric Howard, who serves as the chaplain. Other residents who have proven stable will also help. But Roe said they are not equipped to provide the treatment that so many desperately need.

“Why would any parents bring a kid to a homeless shelter who was severely mentally ill? And the only answer I could come to is they don’t know what to do, that they are at the end of their rope,” he said. “They need some place where they can go to live happy lives and somewhat independent with structure.”

Roe said the number of mentally ill people who are on the streets without proper medication is disturbing.

“There’s a lot of very disturbing things going on,” Roe said. “You have someone that’s hearing voices and they aren’t being medicated, they can get extremely violent. They think someone is saying this stuff to them and the next thing you know, they are starting a fight. People don’t understand the severity of the problem that we have. I don’t know what to do. We are tired because we have to babysit these guys. A homeless shelter is not the right place for these young people that need help.”

About 40 men typically stay at the Beacon. Roe said about half of them staying for years at a time before they get the help they need.

“If a mentally ill person comes to us, an autistic kid, how long do people think he will be with us?” Roe said. “The reality is he could be here two years. A mentally ill elderly person who is in their 70s and 80s we have had stay as long as three or four years before we could get the proper housing. The system is broken and it needs fixed.”

Roe said the issue comes down to available psychiatric beds in the state. There are simply not enough of them.

“Having more hospital beds for the mentally ill and longer term help for them,” he said.

Roe traces part of the problem back to 2016 when then-Gov. Terry Branstad dramatically reduced the number of mental health beds in the state.

“We have people that cannot get help,” Roe said. “They cannot get housing. They aren’t taking their meds. They are walking around town, screaming and carrying weapons — looting, threatening people. They need to be locked up. Straight up.”

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State Rep. Ann Meyer, R-Fort Dodge, recognizes the seriousness of the mental health problem in Iowa. In January, she introduced four bills addressing mental health.

“Mental health is my priority,” Meyer said. “We are in a crisis. We were in a crisis before the pandemic and it’s only gotten worse.”

One of Meyer’s bills would have increased the bed capacity at the state-owned Cherokee and Independence mental health institutes by 50 percent. That equates to 32 more beds for adults and 14 more beds for children and adolescents. However, that bill did not make it through, Meyer reported on Friday.

Instead, a bill proposed by state Sen. Jeff Edler, R-State Center, would increase the beds at those facilities by one wing each, which according to Meyer, is about 12 beds per wing.

Another of Meyer’s bills focuses on the University of Iowa’s residency program.

Her bill calls for creating new psychiatric residencies at each of these sites: Cherokee Mental Health Institute, Independence Mental Health Institute, Woodward Resource Center, Glenwood Resource Center, Iowa State Training School for Boys and the Department of Corrections’ Iowa Medical and Classification Center. The original bill had three sites. Three more sites were added during subcommittee.

“I am really excited about that because that will add 12 psychiatrists to the University of Iowa per year once the first class graduates,” Meyer said. “That is moving. We have the money in the budget for that. That was unanimously passed through Human Resources and I will be running it through appropriation next week and then will go to the floor. That bill is moving along.”

She said the University of Iowa supports it.

“The University of Iowa is completely on board with this,” she said. “They do not have any problems with establishing the new residency because we have so many patients in Iowa that need to be seen.”

A third bill from Meyer would provide additional student loan relief to physicians, nurse practitioners and therapists with prescribing privileges. However, they must be working in psychiatry to take advantage of this program.

“We have increased it to add therapists and counselors and have increased the loan repayment to $1.5 million per year,” Meyer said. “To get that you have to promise five years of service to Iowa. We hope because they have five years here while putting down roots, hopefully they will develop their practice and stay in Iowa. That’s always the goal of a loan repayment program.”

The fourth bill from Meyer calls on the state Department of Human Services to establish a new Medicaid reimbursement rate for people needing a higher level of inpatient psychiatric care.

Medicaid is the federal-state health insurance program for the disabled and poor.

Meyer said there’s also a bill focused on tracking health information throughout the state.

“We have a statewide sharing bill to make sure we have all the hospitals on the same page with reporting bed status,” Meyer said. “It requires all hospitals to participate in a certain software system. It will also require all insurance companies to participate in the same system. That has just passed subcommittee.”

According to Meyer, updated numbers from the state, hospital systems and insurance companies is needed to create the most accurate picture of needs in the state.

“If we don’t have data from all three points, we don’t have an accurate picture for the state and it’s hard to budget the needs unless everyone contributes,” she said. “We have been trying to get information for years to accurately portray what beds we have available in Iowa and some hosptials are not contributing throughout the state.”

Meyer said she remains committed to improving mental health care for Iowans.

“During the pandemic we have seen a higher rate of substance abuse disease, substance abuse disorder, anxiety, depression,” Meyer said. “Our needs were high before the pandemic. They are even higher now. Through the roof.”

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