"Although Commercial Development Co. and its affiliates have pledged to revive the former industrial sites they purchase, residents are often stuck looking at undeveloped acreage for years."
"In 2017, a Missouri-based corporation called Jaines LLC forked over $9.6 million in exchange for 110 acres of vacant buildings and cracked concrete in Janesville, Wisconsin.
The corporation was an affiliate of Commercial Development Co. (CDC), which bills itself as North America’s leading redeveloper of industrial brownfields, and the vacant lot was the former site of General Motors’ Janesville Assembly Plant, which had employed a tenth of the town’s workforce before closing in 2009.
CDC billed its purchase as the beginning of an economic rebirth, touting the site as a “strategic opportunity for new manufacturing, warehousing and logistics-related development activity.” It proceeded to demolish the plant and auction off the equipment salvaged from the site.
Since then, large piles of rubble have continued to dot the property, in violation of city ordinances, according to city manager Kevin Lahner, who reported that the company has been regularly delinquent on its taxes. The property remains under Jaines LLC’s ownership despite at least one attempt to sell it. Frustrated by the company’s lack of progress on bringing the site back into productive use, city officials moved to condemn it last year. Of CDC’s initial promises of cleanup and redevelopment, Lahner said, “the city of Janesville was sold a bill of goods when they acquired that property and now we’re trying to un-ring that bell.”"
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