Matthew Moroun has a big job ahead of him.

Not just building a new bridge to Windsor to replace his family’s aging Ambassador Bridge. Not just cleaning up the derelict McLouth Steel site in Trenton that his family is buying from Wayne County. And not just running the vast trucking and logistics network that provides his family’s considerable wealth.

Matt Moroun’s biggest task may be rebranding — "rescuing" may be a better word — his family’s reputation from decades of noxious relations with the community. Under his father, Manuel (Matty) Moroun, now 90, the Moroun name came to stand for endless lawsuits, antagonistic relationships with neighbors and bitter opposition to any move that appeared to threaten their business in any way.

But in recent years, as Matthew Maroun took over day-to-day control of the family’s companies from his father, he’s tried to take a more positive approach, one that would heal some of the divisions created in the past.

As he told me on Friday, a day after Wayne County commissioners had agreed to sell him the 200-acre McLouth Steel site downriver, cooperation should be the order of the day.

“I think on the merits we’ve always had a good direction, but maybe we need to — not maybe — we need to communicate it better, and frankly we need to do it where we’re working with others a bit more,” he said. “It’s a lot easier to accomplish your goals if you’re working with others in a positive way.”

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That was a lesson that Matty Moroun never seemed to learn. Had he taken a different approach, the elder Moroun could have embodied the rags-to-riches American dream story much as his contemporary, the late Mike Ilitch, did.

Starting with his family’s modest cartage business and some gas stations, Moroun built a vast trucking and logistics network that spans North America and landed him for a time on Forbes magazine’s list of the wealthiest Americans.

But Moroun tangled with everyone, earning a reputation as the most litigious business leader of his time. In 2012 he even spent a night in Wayne County Jail for contempt for refusing a judge’s order to follow the state’s direction regarding truck traffic coming off the Ambassador Bridge in southwest Detroit. His neglect of the Michigan Central Station, purchased in the mid-’90s, became notorious.

Of course it remains to be seen whether Matthew Moroun will actually change the narrative and take a more conciliatory approach. But in the past couple of years he’s sent some good signals.

Among those: He gave up several acres of family-owned land to enhance Detroit’s Riverside Park in exchange for getting a small strip of land needed to build his new bridge. He’s cleaned up the derelict Michigan Central Station to the point where Crain’s Detroit recently held its glittering Homecoming dinner there.

Attacking the blighted McLouth site could help change the community’s view of the Moroun brand even more.

With its deep-water port, rail lines, and access to expressways, the McLouth site could fit right in with the Morouns’ business model, which includes a large North American trucking network and logistics firms to manage complex shipping needs. It’s unclear what will replace the steel plant at McLouth, but Matthew Moroun suggested a more modern and clean manufacturing site is likely.

“We’re going to spend a couple years just cleaning that site up, just clearing all the old buildings. That site has been misused and abused and neglected and abandoned,” he said. “Clearing that site will make a giant improvement to the community. It looks like hell. Unfortunately a lot of the people in that community are used to driving by that plant, and they shouldn’t be used to it. It should look good.”

Based on comments from various Wayne County commissioners last week as they debated selling the McLouth site to the Morouns, changing the narrative about the Morouns is a long-term task, not short-term PR spin. Matthew Moroun acknowledged as much.

“We have had a couple of good wins lately, so I’m looking over my shoulder,” he told me. “We’re going to remain cautious.”

As he should. The family has a lot of ground to make up. Repairing the Moroun brand may take a full generation. But it appears at least that a change for the better may be in the works.

Contact John Gallagher: 313-222-5173 or gallagher@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @jgallagherfreep.