BY: MORGAN CHILSON
Kansas Reflector
TOPEKA — The city of Leavenworth and CoreCivic will take their fight to court June 25 to determine whether the company can reopen its prison facility as an ICE detention center without going through a permitting process.
Attorneys for Leavenworth filed suit in March in U.S. District Court against the Nashville-based company, which ran the Leavenworth Detention Center before it was closed in 2021. The June 25 hearing is a scheduling hearing.
CoreCivic announced its intent to reopen its prison facility as an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center, which would be named the Midwest Regional Reception Center.
In its initial filing, city attorneys said CoreCivic must apply for and receive a supplemental use permit to reopen and operate the prison.
“Our facility – which has been in Leavenworth since 1992 – is and always has been properly zoned,” said CoreCivic spokesman Ryan Gustin in an email. “Leavenworth’s city code designates our site as an existing special use and lawful conforming use.”
Proper permits?
The city recently passed a resolution that indicated CoreCivic needed permission to open its facility, Gustin said.
“There’s nothing in Leavenworth’s code that allows for such a resolution to rescind zoning,” he said.
City officials do not agree. In a 211-page filing with attachments, their attorneys said that, while the lawsuit is about the need for proper permitting, there were other problems too.
From 1992 to 2021, when CoreCivic operated the detention center, the company “became embroiled in multiple widely publicized scandals resulting from its gross mismanagement of the Facility and the ensuing rampant abuse, violence, and violations of the constitutional rights of its detainees and staff,” the filing said.
“CoreCivic’s mismanagement directly and indirectly impacted the City in countless ways, including for example, by imposing unexpected maintenance costs on its taxpayers, unreasonably increasing the burden on the City’s police and law enforcement agencies to address violent crime, and even impeding the City’s investigation of sexual assaults and other violent crimes against detainees and staff,” the filing said.
The city’s lawsuit contends that CoreCivic was already operating the prison when the city enacted its development rules that require a permit, so the business was grandfathered in under the new rules. But by ceasing operations for three years, the filing said, CoreCivic must now apply for the special use permit.
In fact, CoreCivic applied for a special use permit in February 2025 but about three weeks later withdrew that application, the city’s filing said.
Back and forth
Community activists are speaking about against the idea of CoreCivic operating a prison in Leavenworth.
Former CoreCivic employees regularly speak at city and county meetings about their negative experiences working in the closed detention center, and state organizations including the Kansas ACLU have helped organize press conferences and rallies. Objections include how CoreCivic operates, whether people held at the facility will be released into the community, and general opposition to immigrant detention centers.
Gustin said the company, as of April 30, had received applications from more than 1,100 people who want to work at the site.
“Despite what politically extreme outsider groups are saying, potential new employees and local business partners are excited to be part of what we’re creating in Leavenworth,” said Misty Mackey, warden of the new facility, in a press release. “We’re looking forward to operating a safe, transparent, accountable facility that will be a positive for this community dedicated to public service.”
Gustin said there has been inaccurate reporting about employees working on a job at the prison to replace the facility’s roof. CoreCivic issued cease-and-desist letters to those who accused the roofing company, Bass Roofing and Restoration, Fort Worth, of hiring workers without the proper permits.
“Any claims that our company has a contractor working for us at our Leavenworth facility that has undocumented or unauthorized workers doing the work are completely false,” he said. “We have been furnished documentation of the legal status of all workers on the roofing project at our facility from the primary contractor and subcontractor.”
The company has said that it will use local contractors at the facility, and Gustin said CoreCivic did reach out to local vendors.
“Experience in roofing our facilities and experience working on our federally contracted facilities is a factor we evaluate in reviewing bids,” he said. “It’s important to note that the roofing contractor who was selected for this project has handled similar work at another of our federal facilities, which required special clearances for workers.”
Collaborative goals
Although aware of community disagreement about the facility, Gustin said CoreCivic wants to work with Leavenworth city and county officials.
“In addition to the impact fees we’ve agreed to pay – and the property tax we already pay – we’ve worked to both listen to and be transparent with the community,” he said.
CoreCivic has offered the following impact fees:
- One-time impact fee of $1,000,000 to the city of Leavenworth
- Annual impact fee of $250,000 to the city of Leavenworth
- Additional $150,000 annually to the police department
Gustin said no one detained at the facility will be released directly into the Leavenworth community, which is one opposition point.
“Our facility will operate with strong oversight and accountability from our government partners, including regular audits and onsite monitors,” he said.