County plans to move ahead with long-stalled jail

Plans to relocate Wayne County's new jail to make way for a soccer stadium appear to be dying as the county announced today that it will try to restart the long-stalled construction project at Gratiot and St. Antoine near Greektown.

County Executive Warren Evans has said for months that he planned to move ahead at the Gratiot site unless he was offered a better deal. He said today the next step in that process — seeking a proposal from Walsh Construction, the only qualified bidder to agree to take the job — will happen Feb. 10.

"Finishing the jail at the Gratiot site is the quickest and most cost-effective solution to this long-standing challenge facing Wayne County," Evans said in a statement. "The county will not consider any alternative proposals after issuing the request for proposal.”

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Evans' statement doesn't close the door to an alternative proposal before that date. But it appears to increase the pressure on businessman Dan Gilbert and Detroit Pistons owner Tom Gores, who last April proposed a $1-billion development at the site that would include a 25,000-seat soccer stadium that could host a Major League Soccer franchise the pair hope to bring to Detroit.

Gilbert's team did not respond to a request for comment on Evans' statement. Gores told the Free Press in August that the site wasn't the determining factor.

“We’re not married to (the jail site)," Gores said at the time. "What we’re married to is getting another sports team in Detroit. We think a soccer franchise in Detroit could be really good. And I think we’re going to get it there, one way or another.”

The sticking point in the deal has been the sale of the land.

Wayne County already has spent more than $151 million at the site to buy the property, clean up pollution, install foundations and girders and build some of the planned complex. The county expects to borrow another $200 million to complete the project there.

Evans has said the county won't leave the Gratiot site for one that costs more unless someone else pays the difference.

In an interview with the Michigan Chronicle last month, Evans raised the possibility that Gilbert might offer to build new facilities elsewhere for $300 million, saying he'd consider that kind of offer because it would include new facilities. But if the county leaves the Gratiot site, it could be forced to repay millions of dollars in federal tax subsidies and lose millions more in coming years.

County Commission Chair Gary Woronchak, D-Dearborn, said he also expects the Gilbert team will make one more proposal for the site, but that Evans has sent a message that the window closes tightly when the RFP is issued.

Woronchak noted that Gilbert and his associates have long been interested in the jail property but haven't found a way to make the numbers work. Evans has respected their efforts but it's time to move on, Woronchak said.

“(Evans is) not playing chicken, and he’s not trying to bargain in the media — he’s just letting it be known that we’re ready to move on with what we’ve been moving forward (on) already,” Woronchak said. “My assumption all along is that we will finish the jail on the Gratiot site. I have never not thought that. It’s the best solution for the taxpayers and that’s who we have to look out for.”

►Related: Key Dates in the Wayne County Jail Project

MLS Commissioner Don Garber said last April that Detroit was not considered for an expansion franchise until Gilbert and Gores proposed a $1-billion investment at the Gratiot site. Garber said he considered the jail site important to Detroit’s bid, though not necessarily a deal-breaker.

Sean Mann, one of the owners of the Detroit City FC, a minor league team that plays in Hamtramck, said the Gilbert-Gores contingent has met with his group a handful of times since April. Mann said he doesn’t think Detroit’s MLS bid hinges on the proposed soccer-specific stadium being built on the failed jail site.

"I think there’s other parcels to be had,” Mann said today in an interview with the Free Press. “They need 10 acres and I think they can find that elsewhere, so I think that gets resolved. As long as they have the finances and the wherewithal to build a stadium, then I think things move along.”

Any proposal to restart the construction would still need approval from the Wayne County Commission, which has been burned once already on the project when it was halted in 2013 amid cost overruns.

If the commission can't agree to a new proposal, Evans could be forced again to seek other options.

The jail was originally proposed to cost $300 million and save the county millions annually by consolidating prisoners from three buildings into one and using new technology to reduce operating costs. But former County Executive Robert Ficano was forced to halt construction when cost estimates ballooned to $391 million and Wayne County prosecutor Kym Worthy launched a criminal probe into the handling of the construction.

She handed the probe off to a one-man grand jury, which indicted three people. A judge later dismissed the charges.

The site has been sitting idle since then, its rusting girders serving as a constant reminder of the failure to complete the project.

Contact John Wisely: 313-222-6825 or jwisely@freepress.com. On Twitter @jwisely. Staff writers George Sipple and John Gallagher contributed to this report.