I loved South Sac. I had my daughter there in Dec 2008 and am going back there some time in the next month or so for #2.
The nurses were completely supportive of my decision to avoid pain meds and I was able to have a natural unmedicated vaginal delivery. I had a very quick labor and the midwife only came in for the pushing stage, but she was also good. One complaint is that I wanted to be a bit more upright for the pushing stage (i.e. use the squatting bar!) but I ended up lying down for it at the midwife's urging. This time I'm going to ask for the bar to be put up as soon as they say it's OK for me to push so that I have more of an option to get upright. They also gave me a routine shot of pitocin after she was born to help with the placenta delivery - I'm going to see if we can wait a bit this time to give it a chance to do it on its own. Since we're going to BF that should give me PLENTY of oxytocin to shrink my uterus down without additional help.
They do have one room with a tub now. If you ask for it they will put you in there if it is available. (You are _not_ allowed to go into labor before me and sneak in there! I want that tub!) :) But they won't let you actually deliver in the tub - once it's time to push you have to move to the bed.
All of the rooms are private and have their own bathroom with a shower with a seat in it.
If you want a birthing ball you have to bring your own, but there is plenty of room for it in the rooms. They are HUGE!
The paperwork they give you will say that you have to have either an IV or a heplock. I had a heplock for my first, but my friend who delivered seven months later refused even that and the nurses had no problem with it. I asked at my tour a month or so ago if I could refuse the IV completely and they said if I could show that I was hydrated and did not need it then they would not make me get it.
They do intermittent monitoring. My labor was so fast that they only got one strip on me before pushing, but it wouldn't have been that big of a deal to get back into bed for more.
Let's see, what else? They will let you eat and drink during labor. There is a mini kitchen down the hall where you can keep food for yourself and your support person.
They have a pretty good standard form for a Birth Plan that you will get if you are receiving the weekly pregnancy emails. If you're not getting them, send me a msg with your email address and I'll send you a copy. I liked it because it had a lot of NUCB friendly items on it and I figured that the nurses were used to seeing it so they would know what I wanted with a quick glance and wouldn't have to spend a bunch of time reading through a hand written birth plan.
The BF help I received was unfortunately a little spotty. I had my LO on my chest for the first hour and she tried nursing but didn't seem to want to latch onto my left breast. I asked to see the consultant, but for whatever reason (perhaps because they took about 11 hours to move me into the post-delivery area vs. the two they say it usually takes - apparently they didn't have a clean room?) I didn't get to see her until the next morning. By that time I'd already freaked out about her losing weight and started a little formula supplementation. And then when the LC came in it was just after I'd tried nursing and I was on to giving her some formula so instead of watching me try to nurse she just took the baby from me and gave her her bottle. Not Terribly Helpful. HOWEVER, the nurse practitioner we saw three times in the next week (LO lost 13% of her body weight initially but once my milk came in I stopped formula supplementation and she gained it back rapidly) was AMAZING and after my LO hit one week old we never looked back - still BF'ing at 21 months and me 37 weeks pregnant.
The post-delivery rooms are private - I think they have two beds in them (or at least one bed and one pull out chair like in the delivery rooms) but you won't have a roomie except for your hubby if he chooses to stay.
I am pretty sure you can have up to five visitors in the delivery room, but we actually had ten in there after I'd delivered and it wasn't a problem. The post-delivery rooms they supposedly limit you to two visitors.
OK, so that was probably more information than you really wanted. :) I hope this helps - I really can't recommend South Sac enough!