Deconstruction Program Suspended Again

Milwaukee’s deconstruction program remains stuck in neutral, with not even the city receiving bids for its own work. The latest hope for salvaging the program relies on a potential coalition of smaller contractors.

The policy, first adopted in 2018, required old homes to be effectively dissembled instead of mechanically demolished. The vision was to create jobs, protect the environment and save money by selling, not landfilling, old materials.

But it hasn’t worked out, with different city officials pointing the finger at one another during a November meeting.

On Feb. 8, the Common Council unanimously voted to suspend the deconstruction requirement, which applies to all privately-owned, one-to-four family homes built before 1930, for an additional year. It’s been suspended since 2019.

Meanwhile, the Department of Neighborhood Services is struggling with the city’s in-house deconstruction work.

“Currently our deconstruction program is not receiving interest for doing this work,” said DNS operations director Thomas G. Mishefske to the Zoning, Neighborhoods & Development Committee on Feb. 1.

A 2021 public notice yielded two interested parties, said Mishefske: Recyclean and KPH Construction.

“We pursued both contractors to explain the program,” he said.

Things progressed to preparing a contract for Recyclean after the firm offered a price to deconstruct 10 city-owned properties. But Mishefske said the company became unresponsive.

“The other contractor, KPH, never responded with pricing for a list of properties we provided to them,” said Mishefske.

A new request for proposals was issued in early February. Responses are due Feb. 18.

Mishefske said the department hopes that retired DNS manager Ron Roberts is able to move forward on his vision of uniting contractors to bid as a coalition.

Roberts was one of many attendees at a November committee meeting where council members expressed their frustration with the program and DNS officials identified the issues from their perspective, including contracting requirements.

Ald. Jose G. Perez asked what happened after that meeting.

“We did meet with Mr. Roberts,” said DNS Commissioner Erica Roberts. She said Ron Roberts, no relation, reiterated his idea to work with a coalition of smaller contractors. “We are fully in support of their initiative.”

Neither Mishefske nor Commissioner Roberts mentioned White Glove Group, a firm the city hired in the fall of 2020 to perform deconstruction work. White Glove replaced Spencer Renovation & Construction, which was fired after the owner became unresponsive.