Contracts reveal the big business of building and operating Alligator Alcatraz

Immigration detention is big business, and business is booming in the Florida Everglades.

To quickly build and operate the migrant detention center known as Alligator Alcatraz, the DeSantis administration has already committed more than $200 million to private contractors, according to state documents reviewed by the Miami Herald. That’s about half the detention center’s estimated $450 million annual price tag.

The contracts and purchase orders made briefly available last week in a state database help explain why the camp of tents and trailers is so expensive. To build and run a small city from scratch in a matter of days, the state purchased services ranging from road construction to tuberculosis tests. For logistical management alone, the state is paying one contractor $78 million.

It’s shaping up to be an expensive endeavor for taxpayers, though the state hopes the federal government will ultimately foot the bill. The Trump administration says each bed at the detention camp is expected to cost $245 a day — roughly the price of one night this week at the Intercontinental Miami hotel.

Critics of the state’s new detention facility have honed in both on the conditions at the site and the cost of building it. To deflect stories about toilets that don’t flush, bugs and other problems, Gov. Ron DeSantis has said that the facility wasn’t intended to be a five-star hotel.

“We’re saying it is not supposed to be the Ritz-Carlton, but we’re paying Ritz-Carlton prices,” said Jeff Brandes, a Republican former state senator who focused on prison reform during his time in office.

Contractors named in this story did not respond to requests for comment. The Florida Division of Emergency Management did not answer questions emailed to a spokeswoman on Friday and Monday.

The contracts

The decision to build a detention camp on an airstrip in the middle of nowhere is a major contributor to the price of the project.

Within days of the announcement by Florida’s attorney general that the state of Florida intended to build “Alligator Alcatraz,” contractors in heavy-duty trucks and semi-trailers began hauling in equipment to the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport. They erected fencing, tents, and other infrastructure, transforming the area into a detention facility capable of housing between 3,000 and 5,000 migrants.

Detailed purchase orders that are no longer available on the state’s public-facing database for contracts help explain what went into the construction on-site, and why it cost so much:

—A $36.8 million purchase order for “TNT site prep” — a reference to the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport — lays out the services provided by Longview International Technology Solutions, a company based in Herndon, Virginia. Roadway construction, at up to 200,000 square yards, was priced at $11 million. Permanent fencing, at 22,000 linear feet, cost the state roughly $6.82 million. Geotechnical surveys, civil engineering, the hiring of project staff, and other deliverables round out the purchase order.

—Gothams LLC, an Austin, Texas-based disaster response company, received a $21 million contract to provide IT infrastructure to support 1,000 detainees, an inmate wristband subscription for 3,000 detainees, and many desktop support services for the site.

—Texas-based emergency response companies Garner Environmental Services and SLSCO LTD each received a $19.8 million contract to provide “buildout and establishment of TNT with ongoing maintenance.”

By the time the state and federal governments began housing detainees at the detention camp on July 2, they needed contractors ready to provide food and medicine, as well as corrections guards and wardens. Contracts and purchase orders show:

—Subsidiaries of emergency management company CDR Companies received two contracts: an $18 million contract to provide services that included roadway developments, armed security guards and fuel for equipment. CDR Healthcare Inc. was hired to build and maintain a medical unit at the facility. The company hired medical staff and provided services, including the administering of drug and tuberculosis tests, with mobile medical units costing $418,500 per day.

—Mississippi emergency relief company Granny’s Alliance Holdings received a $3.3 million contract for “TNT Site Feeding.” The deal, which included bringing in kitchen staff, stated that GAH was responsible for providing food service to detainees and delivering 1,000 meals per day, including those for the operations staff.

—The largest single contract, $78 million, was awarded to Critical Response Strategies. The company was hired to provide operational support for the facility, including camp managers, wardens, corrections officers and other administrative staff. Job postings on LinkedIn and Indeed for positions advertised by the company during the first days that the detention center was open sought correctional officers to staff “a secure detention facility” in a “remote swamp-based facility” in Florida willing to live on site and work 12 hours a day, seven days a week, with two weeks on and one week off. The job listing said they would be paid $2,968 per week. Full housing and meals were to be provided.

Other contracts reviewed by the Herald include $22 million to Doodie Calls Inc. for facility sanitation and $11 million to Meridian Rapid Defense Group to provide 100 trailer kits. IRG Global Management made donations to Florida’s Republican party days before receiving a $2.9 million contract for transportation services.

Emergency spending

The details about the state’s spending — all on contracts facilitated by a years-old immigration emergency declared by Gov. Ron DeSantis — were made public last week by the state in a database, prompting criticism from some government watchdogs and lawmakers.

The documents were posted in the Florida Accountability Contract Tracking System. They showed that the governor used an executive order to expedite state spending. All grants were categorized as “disaster preparedness and relief.”

State Rep. Anna Eskamani, an Orlando Democrat, posted a copy of the purchase order for Critical Response Strategies on social media, showing how the $78 million contract was being spent.

“There are so many other uses for half a billion dollars that can go right into our communities, for teacher pay, for housing affordability, and for hurricane care and response,” Eskamani said in an interview.

After initially posting dozens of detailed contracts and purchase orders on the public database, which showed the per-item amounts being paid to vendors, the state took them offline.

The state did not respond to requests for comment on why the documents were taken down. On Saturday, the state reposted the same documents, but this time limited to only the cover pages.

The average daily cost of ICE detention in 2023 was estimated at $187 per detainee in a 2025 budget document created by the Department of Homeland Security. It is costing the state $245 a bed per day to house detainees at Alligator Alcatraz, according to the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The agency has said the state can seek reimbursement from a $650 million shelter fund.

The Biden administration launched the Shelter and Service Program in 2023, enabling FEMA to award grants to state, local, or nonprofit organizations that provide support services to migrants released from ICE custody.

FEMA did not comment whether the state had already begun requesting reimbursement.

Blaise Ingoglia, a Republican state senator who visited the detention facility on a recent Saturday when lawmakers were invited on guided tours, said Sunday during an interview on WPLG’s This Week in South Florida that the money is well spent.

“I understand the question of: Why are we spending money on detention facilities such as this?” said Ingoglia, who was sworn in Monday as Florida’s new chief financial officer, giving him a position on the state’s new immigration council alongside the governor and other cabinet members. “But the answer is because we have to. Because we have been overrun over the past six, seven years by open borders.”

The state plans to build several detention sites similar to Alligator Alcatraz to hold undocumented immigrants. DeSantis has suggested that Camp Blanding, the Clay County site where the National Guard train, be the location for the next detention facility.

Brandes, during his tenure in the Florida Legislature, proposed numerous legislation to revamp the state’s correctional system. He believes the funds for Alligator Alcatraz should have been used to fix the current correctional system infrastructure. A 2023 KPMG study revealed that the Florida Department of Corrections requires $2.2 billion of repairs to address its aging facilities and staffing shortages.

“I mean, there are a thousand ways they could have done this less expensive,” Brandes said. “But I understand, the alligators were important to them.”