Print edition: 
KANSAS CITY, Kan. —Rainbow Mental Health Center in Kansas City, Kan., will close temporarily while it completes about six months of work to fix fire hazards, state officials said.
Rainbow Mental Health, which provides 36 beds for mentally ill patients for Wyandotte and Johnson counties, failed a recent fire safety inspection.
At a meeting Thursday in Olathe, law enforcement officials, several state legislators and officials with the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services met to discuss how to handle the patients while the center is closed, the Kansas City Star reported.
Rainbow will continue to provide eight beds while the fire hazards are addressed. Patients will be allowed to stay at those beds for up to four days and will then be moved to the Osawatomie state hospital if needed, SRS officials said. Other Rainbow patients will go to a new 30-bed unit at the state hospital, SRS officials said.
The building, which dates from the 1970s, will never be fully up to code but will meet basic safety standards after repairs, officials said.
The state expects to take to Osawatomie about 80 percent of the patients who usually would go to Rainbow, SRS officials said. But the other 20 percent, who are considered combative and dangerous, will have to be taken to Osawatomie by law officers.
Johnson County Sheriff Frank Denning and Wyandotte County Sheriff Don Ash said their deputies will perform that duty so police departments won't have to pull two officers off the street for every transport.
SRS legislative director Gary Haulmark said he would discuss paying the sheriffs for the transports.
Denning said he would welcome that, but "I'll wait to see that check in the mail."
Haulmark said SRS has $500,000 to make the immediate fire repairs and is committed to reopening the center. Rainbow needs at least $1.5 million more to correct other problems but that money is not in the SRS budget request for next year, Haulmark said.
