AUGUSTA – The Riverview Psychiatric Center opened barely a year and a half ago, but a legislative committee is already taking a look at whether the state’s new mental hospital is too small.

The Legislature’s Government Oversight Committee is requesting information from Riverview officials and will decide next month whether to order a feasibility study on expanding the center.

Too many people are simply being turned away from the hospital, said Sen. Elizabeth Mitchell, chairwoman of the committee.

Statistics show the 92-bed hospital has turned away at least 40 percent of qualified patients each month since it opened.

Sixty-one percent of qualified patients were turned away in the first full month of operation, in July 2004.

“The focus [of the committee] is on what’s happening to the people who are not getting a bed in Riverview,” said Mitchell, D-Vassalboro. “No one seems to have a handle on that.”

Riverview opened in June 2004 to replace the Augusta Mental Health Institute. But even as the $31 million hospital was being built, some were questioning whether it had enough beds to meet the need for psychiatric care.

In November, a committee of health professionals concluded Riverview was too small. Although some in the group disagreed, a majority felt the state should expand the facility.

The hospital is designed so it can easily be expanded. But not everyone thinks it should be.

Maine doesn’t need more hospital beds, and instead would be better off investing in improved community mental health services, said Brenda Harvey, deputy commissioner of the Department of Health and Human Services.

Harvey said improved community services would allow patients to leave hospital care sooner and to get treatment closer to their homes. Better crisis response services could help keep people with mental illnesses out of the state hospital entirely, she says.