Gov. Ron DeSantis has signed at least $225 million in no-bid contracts in just the last three weeks to construct and staff the immigration detention center in the Florida Everglades he’s calling “Alligator Alcatraz.”
But the state is hiding some of the details of that spending spree: State officials removed at least 11 contracts detailing this spending from the state’s public transparency website this week.
The deleted contracts, viewed by NOTUS before they were removed, show private companies charging the state steep hourly wages, thousands of overtime hours and more than $11 million for new asphalt and “permanent fencing” — despite DeSantis’ insistence the detention center would have “zero impact” on the protected wetlands. (The question of environmental damage is also a key point in a lawsuit against state and federal officials over the site.)