by Carol Mosley
Despite having only two days’ notice, more than 40 speakers packed the Bradford County Commission meeting on April 16 to comment on the proposal to lease the Douglas warehouse to the sheriff’s department for an immigrant detention center. That would take it out of the hands of the county commission and allow the sheriff to make his own deal with ICE/DHS and the consulting company, Sabot. The item was a last-minute agenda addition.
In an astounding act of solidarity, folks came to Bradford from surrounding counties: Alachua, Clay, Gilchrist, Baker and as far as St. Augustine and Jacksonville.
The original proposal was for a 10,000 square foot warehouse to be converted to hold up to 3,000 migrants headed for deportation.
The county sheriff was pushing the idea as a means to rehab an old warehouse for future use and bring 1200 jobs. Leasing the property to the sheriff’s department was never part of the original proposal.
There is another offer to lease the warehouse to an import company for three years at $50,000 per year.
At the previous commission meeting, only ten days prior, the sheriff was scheduled to present his new lease idea alongside the proposal from OM Imports (OMI). The sheriff was a no-show. So, the commissioners decided to “keep all options on the table.”
The property itself is fraught with obstacles. There is contamination of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) on the site that could become problematic if disturbed.
The Florida Dept. of Environmental Protection (FDEP) recently reached an agreement with the county for unrestricted access to conduct testing. While the site might be acceptable to use for storing stuff, warehousing humans may come with medical consequences. And, there is no water and sewer access that would accommodate a 3,000 bed ICE detention center.