When Platform Ventures approached the Port Authority of Kansas City in 2021 seeking a tax incentive for an industrial campus, the developer promised to “bring jobs back” to south Kansas City.
Takeaways
- A warehouse in south Kansas City could be sold to the federal government to become an ICE detention center. That warehouse, owned by Platform Ventures, had received a $21 million tax incentive from the Port Authority of Kansas City.
- Port KC leaders say that they were blindsided by Platform’s plans, and they say Platform Ventures leaders have not responded to phone calls since the news went public.
- Port KC and city leaders say that a mass detention center with up to 10,000 beds could undermine job creation at neighboring warehouses and industrial facilities. Port KC has ended all negotiations with Platform for future development, calling their behavior “unacceptable.”
Platform Ventures struck a deal to build a 1-million-square-foot warehouse for a burgeoning industrial district on the former Richards-Gebaur Air Force Base. The company promised up to 500 new jobs for Kansas Citians and new property tax revenue for Grandview School District.
In return, the Port Authority, also known as Port KC, would give the developers a break on the first 20 years of property taxes.
Port KC leaders never imagined that the warehouse could later become a site for a massive immigrant detention center that could house thousands of detainees. Platform now plans to sell the facility to the federal government as part of Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s mass deportation crackdown.
“The thing that has been so shocking to me,” said Port KC CEO Jon Stephens, “is that with this action, there was zero communication, zero follow-up. It has been complete radio silence … They have been completely nonresponsive, and that is unacceptable.”
Stephens said Platform Ventures has gone behind Port KC’s back to strike a deal with the federal government — a deal that he and other local leaders worry could undermine their vision for a job hub at the 49 Crossing industrial center on the old air base.
The potential ICE detention center in south Kansas City
News about the warehouse began to trickle out on Jan. 15, when federal agents with the Department of Homeland Security and ICE were given a tour of the warehouse located at 14901 Botts Road.
Jackson County Legislator Manny Abarca IV posted on social media that he drove to the site and confirmed that the federal government was negotiating a sale with Platform Ventures to convert the warehouse into a 7,500-bed detention center.
That was the first that Port KC staff ever heard about Platform Ventures’ plans for the warehouse, though they had learned in early January that a sale to an unidentified buyer was possible.
The news sparked immediate outrage from Kansas City leaders, including Mayor Quinton Lucas and City Councilmember Johnathan Duncan, who represents the 6th District where the warehouse is located.
“Warehousing 10,000 people in an industrial factory is not the move of enlightened or humane societies,” Lucas wrote on social media.
Later that day, the City Council approved a moratorium on non-municipal detention facilities lasting five years. That move may kick off a legal battle, should the federal government choose to move forward at the Platform Ventures site.
In a statement to the media, Platform Ventures wrote that it had been approached with an offer in October 2025 and said it has a “fiduciary duty” to investors to explore that offer.
“PV does not question prospective buyers on their intent after close,” the statement said, “and we will not engage in public conversations involving speculation over future uses.”
Korb Maxwell, an attorney with the Polsinelli law firm representing Platform Ventures, did not respond to a request for comment.
The warehouse received a 20-year tax incentive in 2022
Public records list Port KC as the owner of the land where the warehouse that could become an immigrant detention center is located. But the warehouse is controlled by Platform Ventures.
For years, Port KC has been leading the redevelopment of the former Richards-Gebaur Air Force Base to become an industrial center called 49 Crossing.
That industrial center includes a manufacturing site for plumbing materials, a cold storage warehouse, a Walmart distribution center, a Niagara Bottling plant and other industrial facilities.
As part of that project, Port KC partnered with Platform Ventures to develop warehouses on multiple sites at 49 Crossing.
The potential detention center would be located in Building 7, an $80 million warehouse that received a 20-year property tax exemption in 2022 and was completed at the end of 2023.
That tax exemption explains why Port KC is listed as the landowner. Under its development agreement with Platform Ventures, Port KC purchased the land for a small price and leases it back to Platform Ventures.
As a government agency, Port KC is not required to pay property taxes on the land that it owns. That gives the agency the freedom to negotiate a customized tax rate for developers like Platform Ventures, called a payment in lieu of taxes, or PILOT.
In this case, Platform Ventures was given a 95% property tax break until 2032, then they would gradually pay more every year until the tax break expires in 2042. At that point, Port KC would transfer the title to Platform Ventures.
Since the deal was signed, Platform Ventures has paid $267,451 in PILOTs on Building 7. By 2042, it would have paid another $8.1 million.
Without the tax incentive, Platform Ventures would have owed a total of $29 million in property taxes for Building 7 over those 20 years, making the incentive worth $21 million.
But if Platform Ventures sells the land to the federal government, taxing jurisdictions including the Grandview School District, Kansas City and Jackson County will not get that extra $8.1 million they were promised over the next 16 years.
And the warehouse — which received a tax incentive under the expectation that it would one day generate more money for those taxing jurisdictions — will never go back on the tax rolls because it would be owned by the federal government.
In addition, Platform Ventures is required to make a $30,500 “community benefit payment” every year to the Grandview School District. If the warehouse becomes a detention center, the schools will lose out on the $210,000 that Platform Ventures has not yet paid over the next six years.
“It is supposed to be an industrial park,” said Port KC general counsel Brian Rabineau. “That’s what our mission is. That’s why we provided incentives. The project was supposed to create jobs, add to the tax base, grow the economy. We never in a million years imagined that an industrial facility would be turned into a detention center.”
‘We have literally no say’
Although Port KC holds the title for the proposed detention center site, it has very little power to stop the deal.
Rabineau said that if Platform Ventures were to sell the land to another private company, Port KC would have more levers to pull. The new owners would want to keep the development agreement active so they could continue taking advantage of the tax incentives.
But the federal government, on the other hand, has no reason to keep a development agreement with Port KC because it doesn’t owe property taxes anyway.
So if Platform Ventures sells the warehouse to the federal government, it will terminate its development agreement with Port KC, ending any authority that Port KC currently has over how that land is used.
“They paid the price to build the building,” he said. “We hold (the title) for purposes of the incentives. If they don’t need the incentives or want the incentives, they just tell us, ‘We don’t want them.’”
And Platform Ventures has already made that request to Port KC.
Rabineau said that the company asked Port KC to begin the process of transferring the land title on Jan. 2, and the agency has 90 days to transfer the title back to Platform Ventures. At that point, Platform Ventures will be able to sell the title to the federal government.
“We have literally no say,” Rabineau said. “Our development agreements say outright that if a developer wants to take back fee title at any point in time, all they have to do is tell us, and that starts a 90-day clock that we have to comply with.”
The only reason Port KC could say no is if Platform Ventures had violated the development agreement by missing payments or if they had never built what they said they would. That is not the case for Building 7.
“There’s a perception in some circles that Port KC is actively involved in this and supporting the transfer,” Rabineau said. “And there’s obviously some people in the community that are upset about that. This is literally a scenario where they’ve told us they want it, and we have an obligation to transfer it back to them.”
A detention center could hurt industrial job growth at 49 Crossing
Stephens is concerned that the apparent plans to convert the Building 7 warehouse into a DHS detention center could smother economic activity at the new 49 Crossing industrial district.
Port KC’s intent with this site is to have a logistics and manufacturing hub close to a railroad. And he said that any land use decision around that site needs to be aligned with that goal.
“When you look at something like a detention facility,” he said, “that could have a very strong detrimental effect to future growth of jobs, and really the current businesses that are there, the growth of those businesses, new hiring of employees, and even future manufacturing job attraction.”
Port KC had been notified at the beginning of January that Platform Ventures wanted to terminate the development agreement. But it wasn’t until Jan. 15 — the day that DHS and ICE agents toured the facility — that Stephens learned that the company intended for the warehouse to be converted into a detention facility.
Once Stephens learned about their intentions, he reached out to the co-presidents of Platform Ventures, Ryan and Terry Anderson. More than two weeks later, he still has not gotten any response from them.
(The Kansas City Business Journal published a profile of the Anderson brothers in 2019.)
“Their lack of communication and non-responsiveness, I think, says it all,” he said. “And to me, that is enough for me to have grave concerns about what they may or may not be doing.”
Port KC staff have ended any negotiations with Platform Ventures, which was considering purchasing more land at 49 Crossing for development.
The Port KC Board of Commissioners will likely take up a resolution to formalize that decision later this month.
“At the staff level, we’ve already terminated discussions with them on additional land purchases,” Rabineau said. “We’ve asked the board to formalize that with a resolution, but as a practical matter, at the staff level, discussions have terminated on any future projects there.”
Councilman Duncan said it’s unacceptable for a business like Platform Ventures to receive public support and then use that benefit to undermine the city’s development interests.
“The only reason this business exists and has been successful is because of massive public investment through the Port Authority,” Duncan said. “Its intended use is logistics and warehousing, and that’s not what it’s being used for. And it’s jeopardizing the public investment for the surrounding businesses in that logistics hub.”
