The Cass County Memorial Hospital’s seven member Board of Trustees this (Wednesday) morning voted to keep the Behavioral Health Unit at the hospital, even though the bids to remodel a portion of the facility for a scaled down version of the BHU came in at a greater than anticipated cost. The Board approved the remodeling project and to retain the BHU by a vote of 4-to 2, with board members Lois Casey, Jerry Putnam, Phyllis Stakey and Ned Brown voting in favor, and Leanne Pellett, John Molgaard voting against.

The plan is to move forward with the remodeling of the special care unit to house a four-bed BHU. It was just last week that the hospital board opened bids for the electrical, mechanical and general construction portions of the project. Hospital officials said while the electrical and mechanical bids came in at around projected costs, the general construction bid was higher than expected, primarily due to certain specifications pertaining to the type of glass used, and other such issues.