Development or treatment?

If nothing else, we hope that Kenneth Smith instilled in readers of the News & Observer a measure of perspective, a tad of guilt for their own preoccupations, and a spark of desire to improve the care of people like those no longer in Dorothea Dix Hospital. In his excellent letter to the editor, he says, in part:

Years ago the decision was made to close Dorothea Dix ... Collectively discussed was whether this priceless piece of real estate should be park land, condos, offices or
other forms and combinations of the ubiquitous development that crawls like
kudzu over Raleigh.

Conspicuously absent from the discussion is the asking of a simple question: Are mental patients better off as a result of closing Dix?