Land sale clears path for halfway house project
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By Tory Brecht | Saturday, June 09, 2007 |
Construction could begin this fall on a 120-bed facility housing work-release and probationary criminals in the 600 block of Main Street in Davenport.
For five years, officials from the 7th Judicial District Department of Correctional Services have tried to find a site for the DOC’s expanded halfway house. On Friday, the 7th District’s board agreed to pay Davenport businessman Dudley Priester $295,000 for a piece of property that lies adjacent to the DOC’s current facility at 605 Main St.
Nearly six months ago, negative publicity forced the department to scrap plans to renovate the former Sears store on 4th Street as a future site for the halfway house.
Esther Dean, who chairs the DOC’s 7th District board, is hopeful the controversy has ended.
“I’m very pleased we’re moving forward with this project,” she said. “We’re beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel.”
A new halfway house is needed because mold problems in the current building make it unsafe for occupancy. The 7th Judicial District was awarded $10.5 million by the Iowa Legislature three years ago for a new, expanded facility that would increase the number of beds from 80 to 120.
In addition to the mold problem, the Davenport facility remains one of the oldest and most rundown in the state and is often overcrowded.
Not everyone is enthused about the decision to remain downtown.
“Allowing 1,500 criminals a year to finish their prison terms in our central city is shameful,” said 4th Ward Alderman Ray Ambrose. “The impact of this on the city and its battle on crime is huge. For them to expand the operation makes it that much harder for the city to become a better community.”
Ambrose particularly objects to the fact that many members of the 7th Judicial District’s board hail from Clinton, Muscatine, Maquoketa and other communities from throughout the five-county district.
“We allow a bunch of people from outside Davenport to jeopardize our city,” he said. “I think it’s horrible. What we should be doing is demanding that our legislators get tough on crime and tough on repeat criminals. They should be locking them up and keeping them locked up.”
Jim Wayne, supervisor of the 7th Judicial District, said the Davenport Zoning Board of Adjustment likely needs to approve a special-use permit for the new building, even though it is in nearly the same location as the current building.
However, he anticipates that fact will make getting approval less challenging than it might have been on 4th Street.
“Looking purely at reaction, the neighbors in the immediate vicinity of this site know who we are,” he said. “At the other proposed location, we were an unknown to the majority of people.”
Wayne said he’s hopeful demolition of the existing building — which will require asbestos mitigation — can begin this fall. He’s optimistically hoping to have the new six-story facility open in January 2009.
He expects the scope of the project to remain the same, but noted the original cost estimates were set in 2002, and construction costs have climbed in the past five years. The $10.5 million appropriation from the state has to cover design, demolition and construction.
“The longer we delay, the more construction costs increase,” Dean said.
Tory Brecht can be contacted at (563) 383-2329 or tbrecht@qctimes.com.
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