When Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw last year embraced a plan to build a vocational high school on land near the long-shuttered county stockade, Hispanic activist Jorge Garrido believed his dream to train teens for well-paying jobs was within reach.
Then, three weeks ago, Bradshaw’s top jail administrator said the agency didn’t want to give up any of the county-owned land that surrounds the stockade near the Palm Beach County Fairgrounds.
The nearly 40 acres is one of the few sites in the county where a jail or other law enforcement facilities can be built, Col. Alfonso Starling wrote in a March 20 letter to county officials, who control the land.
“The Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office recommends that the Central Detention Center property and its surrounding land remain reserved exclusively for the Sheriff’s Office’s current and future operational requirements,” Starling concluded, using the official name for the stockade.
The letter was in stark contrast to one Bradshaw wrote a year earlier in which he said the school’s use of the land had his “full support” because it would be “immensely beneficial for both the community and our students.”
Garrido said he was disappointed, but not surprised, by the about-face that threatens — and may kill — plans for the school that would help low-income and low-achieving students in the central part of the county.
For months, county officials have been throwing up roadblocks to derail the plan to build a 1,200-student branch campus of the A-rated Boynton Beach area SouthTech Schools on 11 acres near the stockade, he said. It would be called SouthTech Academy.
“I would bet everything I own that (a top county administrator) or someone contacted the sheriff and said that land needs to be taken off the table,” said Garrido, a financial planner who heads up Hispanic Vote, which endorses political candidates.
Garrido said he suspects the planned school was a victim of bad blood between him and county Mayor Sara Baxter.
Emerging plans to rebuild or move the 12-story main jail, towering over President Donald Trump’s golf course off Summit Boulevard, may also have been a factor, he said.
County Administrator Joe Abruzzo acknowledged that he is analyzing the 34-year-old jail on Gun Club Road to determine whether it should be renovated or relocated.
“We are getting close to making a decision on expending hundreds of millions of dollars on renovating the existing jail,” he said. “The building is massively out of date.”
Having just spent $42 million renovating the sheriff’s administrative offices next to the jail and with millions of dollars in more improvements in the pipeline, Abruzzo said no decisions have been made about the jail’s future. “The administration is exploring alternative sites,” he said. “It’s strictly an exploratory effort.”
But, he insisted, land at the stockade isn’t being considered as a new home for the nearly 2,200-bed jail.
Likewise, given the sheriff’s latest position on the need for the land at the stockade, Abruzzo said there are no plans to lease the land to Garrido’s group or anyone else.
Garrido blames Baxter
But, Garrido insisted, plans for the school were moving forward before he talked with Baxter, a fellow Republican. Her support was key because the stockade is in her district.
She said she would back his request to use land at the stockade for the school only if he would guarantee she would receive Hispanic Vote’s endorsement in her November reelection bid, Garrido said.
“I told her, ‘No, we have a process,’” Garrido said. “It was highly offensive. I’ve never had anyone try to extort an endorsement out of me.”
Baxter countered that Garrido was seeking preferential treatment.
“It is unfortunate that he feels that way,” she said. “It is illegal for us to give preference to one applicant over another.”
During the public comment period of a February County Commission meeting, Garrido and other members of his steering committee and SouthTech students spoke passionately about the need for a vocational school in the central part of the county.
Having submitted his proposed plan in October, Garrido hoped the public show of support for the project would push commissioners to agree to put it on the agenda where a vote could be taken.
Instead, even before all of the supporters addressed the commission, Baxter asked county staff to put together “options for the potential future use of land at the stockade for civic or educational purposes by a third party.”
That was far short of what Garrido hoped to accomplish. He viewed Baxter’s action as yet another delay that would keep the project in limbo.
Last week, Baxter said she asked staff to develop a request for proposals for a vocational school on the property at the stockade. After receiving Starling’s letter, the plans for the RFP were shelved, she said.
No bids for Vanderbilt land
Garrido bristled at the notion that he and his group of education leaders were trying to skirt county rules to get preferential treatment.
Vanderbilt University wasn’t forced to respond to an RFP before the commission in 2024 agreed to give the Nashville-based school 5 acres in downtown West Palm Beach worth an estimated $46 million. The move came as the city donated an adjoining 2 acres worth $14 million so Vanderbilt can build a 1,000-student graduate school
“They gave a $65 million piece of property to Vanderbilt University, which has an endowment of $11 billion,” Garrido said. “They’d rather give money to billionaires than give us a worthless piece of property to provide opportunities to kids who otherwise would struggle and be in trouble with the law.”
Doing an RFP would have been a needless and potentially risky expense, forcing his all-volunteer group to spend money it doesn’t have, Garrido said.
Money is already tight, he said. As a charter school, it will receive money from the state and also has favorable financing lined up. But, given the extra costs of a vocational school, such as a body shop for automotive classes and a kitchen for culinary lessons, they will have to also rely on donations.
He described the RFP process as a “bureaucratic blackhole” with no guarantees that all the time and effort would pay off. Another bidder could be selected.
Florida law allows the commission to consider unsolicited bids from groups for a public-private partnership. It can advertise that it is considering a proposal and allow others to bid or it can determine a project is in the public interest and approve it without allowing others to bid.
Because the proposal was never put on a commission agenda, those options were never explored.
School Board member thought SouthTech had a deal
Whether the loss of the land at the stockade is the death knell for the school, estimated to cost $25 million, remains to be seen.
Garrido has asked Palm Beach County School District officials if he could use the long abandoned Adult Education Center on Military Trail just north of Okeechobee Boulevard. He was told the district has plans for the building. School officials didn’t return emails to Stet News to explain those plans.
School Board member Karen Brill said the recent turn of events is unfortunate.
“I completely support SouthTech and the school they are proposing,” she said in an email. “I thought the property by the stockade was already agreed to by the county, but apparently not. I was very disappointed to hear that.”
Garrido said he will watch to see what, if anything, happens to the land at the stockade. In his letter, Starling said both the main jail and the one in Belle Glade are nearing capacity.
As a member of the county’s Criminal Justice Commission, Garrido said he was surprised to hear that. Typically, he said, the commission keeps tabs on the jail population and is alerted if crowding looms.
Ultimately, Garrido said his only recourse may be the ballot box. Voters will be reminded that their elected officials failed to help kids, particularly Hispanic youth, secure their futures.
Baxter faces a Republican Party challenger, Elizabeth Accomando, and two Democrats have filed to run as well.
“You didn’t do it for our community. These kids really need this,” Garrido said of the message. “The only thing we can do is hold them politically accountable.”
See SouthTech’s school plan here.
This story was originally published by Stet News Palm Beach, a WLRN News partner.
