Detroit taxpayers will likely end up paying millions of dollars to dig out and replace contaminated dirt that was used to fill hundreds of home-demolition sites across the city, the city's top lawyer told a special City Council session on Friday, October 30, 2026 — because the contractor the city blames for the bad fill is shutting down and, in his words, is unlikely to have the money to pay the bill. Corporation Counsel Conrad Mallett, answering a question from Council President James Tate, who convened the session, opened bluntly: “I don't have good news.” Mallett said the Gayanga Co. organization, “if not bankrupt, soon will be,” and that unless state or federal grants arrive, the cost of testing and remediation will most likely land on Detroiters themselves. The city puts the overall price of addressing 655 questionable sites at more than $20 million.
Source: BridgeDetroit, Oct. 30, 2026 (special Detroit City Council session)
The numbers the council heard on Friday, from Tim Palazzolo, director of the city's Construction & Demolition Department, describe the scale. Of the sites identified so far, 533 are publicly owned, most of them held by the Detroit Land Bank Authority. Of the publicly owned sites that have been tested, 500 have not met safety standards, and 380 of them have not yet been excavated. Within that group, officials have ranked 195 sites as presenting an “elevated risk” — the contamination in them can evaporate, rise up through the soil and, over time, get into the air inside nearby buildings — and those 195 lots are to be fixed first.
Source: BridgeDetroit, Oct. 30, 2026 (special Detroit City Council session)
What it will cost, and where the money stands
Palazzolo put the fix for the 195 elevated-risk parcels at around $6.7 million, or roughly $34,554 per property, and the expected cost of remediating the remaining contaminated sites at around $12 million in all, with the city's total damages “pushing the $20 million mark.” The work has been split into three priority tiers, and the first two tiers are slated for completion by 2029, a timeline officials attribute to contracting, approvals and seasonal limits on digging. The city set aside $15 million of blight funding in late 2025 in a dedicated cost centre in the Construction & Demolition Department budget for testing and remediation, and $8.4 million of that remains; Palazzolo stressed that the fund is used for nothing else, and that the department's budget carries separate money for emergency demolitions and stabilisation. Mallett added one more obstacle to getting someone else to pay: the city's environmental insurer is, he said, “resisting, forcefully,” responsibility for the program, though the city will keep pressing the insurer for recovery.
Source: The Mitten Daily, Oct. 30, 2026, reporting BridgeDetroit
What is solid
- 500 publicly owned tested sites have not met safety standards and 380 have not yet been excavated; 195 are ranked elevated risk and come first (Construction & Demolition director Tim Palazzolo, to the council, Oct. 30).
- Fixing the 195 lots is estimated at about $6.7 million (about $34,554 each); remaining remediation is put at around $12 million; $15 million was set aside in late 2025 and $8.4 million remains (officials, Oct. 30).
- The city blames Gayanga Co. and owner Brian McKinney; the city Inspector General suspended both last fall, EGLE and FBI Detroit investigations are ongoing, and McKinney had not been served with a city lawsuit as of Friday (Corporation Counsel Conrad Mallett).
- These are the city's allegations and findings from its own testing programme; Gayanga and the Iron Horse soil supplier have denied wrongdoing in earlier reporting, and no court has decided responsibility.
What is only claimed
- The total bill: June 2026 reporting put the cleanup estimate at up to $27 million — roughly triple an earlier $8 million forecast — with 80% of completed sites exceeding state limits (Detroit Free Press via Planet Detroit). The October 30 council figures put total damages 'pushing $20 million' with about $12 million for remaining remediation. The estimates differ in scope and date; the final total is not settled.
- How dangerous the sites are today: the health chief says contamination does not always equal exposure, while a council member argues wind-blown dirt is already reaching sidewalks, cars and neighbouring homes.
When Detroit tears down a blighted house, the hole left behind must be backfilled with clean dirt from an approved source, then covered with topsoil. The city's case is that fill brought from a Milford site called Iron Horse did not meet safety standards — so hundreds of finished, grassed-over lots now have to be dug up again, tested and refilled, at about $34,554 a lot for the highest-risk group.
Who the city blames — and what they say back
The city has accused Detroit-based Gayanga Co. and its owner, Brian McKinney, of backfilling demolition holes with contaminated dirt, much of it from the Iron Horse site in Milford. Gayanga won tens of millions of dollars in city demolition contracts starting in 2018. The city's Office of the Inspector General suspended the company and McKinney last fall from working in Detroit. Mallett told the council the burden now falling on citizens is directly related to what the city believes were at least significant contractual violations, if not criminal behaviour — that is the city's allegation, not a court finding. Investigations by the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE) and the FBI's Detroit office are ongoing, he said, and the city has found no evidence the problem extends beyond Gayanga. He also noted Iron Horse itself held no contract with the city; it was an approved dirt source based on a consultant's work. McKinney announced in May that Gayanga was shutting down and that he was suing the city for defamation, saying the case arises from false and materially misleading public statements; earlier reporting records that both Gayanga and Iron Horse deny wrongdoing. Mallett said the city had not yet served McKinney with its own legal action, although the Law Department had previously signalled it would pursue cost recovery for total damages.
Source: BridgeDetroit, Oct. 30, 2026 (special Detroit City Council session)
The health argument inside the council chamber
Council Member Angela Whitfield-Calloway pressed the city to declare a public health emergency, arguing that the orange fencing around the lots is not containing the dirt — that it is blowing onto sidewalks, cars and nearby property, and that children and adults are walking through it. Chief Public Health Officer Ali Abazeed, who joined the department this spring, said officials under Mayor Mary Sheffield are treating the issue seriously and urgently and are closely scrutinising the health impacts, but he cautioned that “contamination does not always equal exposure.” Council Member Denzel McCampbell asked for assurances the city will not face the same problem again with soil suppliers and contractors. Mallett acknowledged past gaps — some contractors were authorised without adequate documentation — and said those have been corrected; the city is also exploring securing its own fill dirt in future. Separately, the council had earlier this year approved a $3.5 million increase, on top of an original $1 million contract, for the Mannik and Smith Group's environmental consulting work covering backfill-testing due diligence.
Source: BridgeDetroit, Oct. 30, 2026 (special Detroit City Council session)
Private lots, and the new rules for clean dirt
The problem may not stop at public land. The city is trying to test 120 privately owned parcels as well: 50 owners have agreed, seven have refused, and 63 have not answered. If the remaining owners do not respond by spring, the city plans to seek administrative warrants to test — though Mallett said it would move sooner than spring if health officials identify a risk. Demolition crews now take backfill only from seven inspected public pits — two in Milford and one each in Pinckney, Washington Township, Petersburg, Milan and Maybee — down from 14 sources. The pits are inspected monthly by the demolition department and its environmental consultants, and soil is sampled and analysed before it leaves each source site. Residents can check a site's testing and excavation status on the city's fill-material testing page, or contact the department at demo-info@detroitmi.gov or 313-224-4737.
Source: City of Detroit Construction & Demolition Department, fill-material test results page
Background: a demolition programme of unusual scale
Detroit has run one of the largest home-demolition programmes in the United States, tearing down tens of thousands of blighted houses — the city said in 2023 that it had demolished more than 25,000 dangerous vacant buildings since 2014. That scale is why a failure in something as basic as fill dirt becomes a citywide problem: each demolished house leaves a filled lot in the middle of a lived-in neighbourhood, next to homes, sidewalks and schools. The contamination bill has also grown as testing widened: by June 2026, reporting based on the city's testing put the cleanup estimate at up to $27 million, roughly triple an earlier $8 million forecast, with 80% of completed sites exceeding state contamination limits. Friday's council session was the moment the city conceded, in public, that the party it blames probably cannot pay — which is why the argument has now shifted to grants, insurance and the city's own blight budget.
Source: Planet Detroit, June 5, 2026, summarising Detroit Free Press reporting
What happens next
Three clocks are now running. First, the dig-out itself: the 195 elevated-risk lots go first, the first two priority tiers are due by 2029, and the dedicated fund — $8.4 million left of $15 million — has to cover testing and replacement unless grants or recoveries arrive. Second, the money fight: the city says it will keep pressing its environmental insurer, and a cost-recovery case against Gayanga has been signalled but, as of Friday, McKinney had not been served; EGLE's and the FBI's investigations continue in parallel. Third, the private parcels: owners who have not answered face administrative warrants by spring, or sooner if the health department sees a risk. For neighbours of any single lot, the practical step officials point to is the city's fill-material testing page, which tracks testing, removal and replacement site by site. Awaaz Punjab will follow the first tier of excavations and any filing in the cost-recovery case.
Source: The Mitten Daily, Oct. 30, 2026, reporting BridgeDetroit