DNR working with private companies to restore, fund Belle Isle Boat House

Concern about the fate of the Belle Isle Boat House has resurfaced after an annual report presentation on Belle Isle during a Detroit City Council meeting on Tuesday.

The boathouse, built in 1902 and used to house the Detroit Rowing Club, has stood dilapidated and empty since August 2022, when sections of the ceiling, floor, and exterior stucco collapsed. After architects estimated the cost of restoration efforts at around $54 million, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (DNR), which acquired the boathouse when it acquired Belle Isle in 2014, has searched for solution after solution to make use of its limited funding.

The DNR has toyed with the idea of demolition, and although it's still not off the table, they are now attempting to partner with a private company to save the building and possibly reimagine the boathouse.

"We did send out a public survey to ask folks what they would like to see, and obviously, the majority of the public's sentiment was to save it. ... But that doesn't mean that the funding is there to do so," said Thomas Bissett, the urban district supervisor for the parks and recreation division of the Michigan DNR. "I don't think that (the DNR) wants to demolish it ... What we want is that if it's something that's going to be restored, for it be restored appropriately but then also for it to be funded in the future."

Earlier this year, the DNR began accepting proposals from private companies to redevelop the boathouse, hoping for proposals from people with backgrounds in development and historical rehabilitation with financial backing to submit a viable proposal.

More: Belle Isle’s transformation under state control: What's changed, what's still coming

By the March 31 deadline, the DNR had received five letters of intent, three of which were selected to move forward in the process. They now have until July 31 to submit a formal proposal to the DNR.

"At that point, we would sit down and review them and see if any of them are viable, as far as being able to first fund it but continue to operate it through their plan," said Bissett. "It'd be great to fix it, but it has to fund the facility, and most importantly we want a key aspect of that to remain open to the public. The last thing we want is it to be a building on Belle Isle that's not open to the public.

"We can do lots of improvements, but if we restore the building so it just sits there, that doesn't make any sense for the public."

More: Belle Isle Boat House needs $54M renovation as demolition remains an option

Bissett said that the DNR does not know the extent or viability of the proposals.

"No decision has been made yet to whether one of these proposals would be accepted or whether (the boathouse) would be demolished. ... What they gave us in that letter of intent was just a skeleton. They identified a potential use and potential funding but nothing was set in stone," said Bissett.

What's more, the DNR is on a time crunch. Bissett said the $23 million in funding for the park that the DNR has from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) must be allocated and signed in a construction contract by the end of this year.

In the meantime, Bissett and the DNR have been taking the people behind the proposals, as well as any engineers, financiers, and other experts, to view the site and assist them in creating their formal submissions at the end of July.

"The main thing is that we've done exactly what we said we were going to do: We said we were going to ask the public and we did so, we said we were going to put out a request for letters of intent and we did so, and now we're working with those three groups to help them develop their proposal going forward," said Bissett.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Belle Isle Boat House: 3 private companies to submit formal proposals