MILWAUKEE — The City of Milwaukee is tearing down a dilapidated building near Holton and Burleigh. This move comes after years of TMJ4 reporting that exposed safety concerns at a neighboring youth mental health center.
The building sat on Milwaukee's "do not acquire" list, which includes 152 properties classified as brownfields. These properties are years behind on property taxes, but due to contamination and expensive liability concerns, the city has typically refused to repossess them.
The city's Department of Neighborhood Services recently awarded a $90,000 contract to demolish the structure.
Mario Costantini, a Riverwest neighborhood revitalization advocate, said the building's condition had long posed dangers to the surrounding area.
"Parts of the building are falling off into the sidewalk, and there's just hazards everywhere," Costantini said.
His biggest concern has always been the impact on the youth mental health center next door, called STRONG.
Rachel Urfer, STRONG's program director, previously described what staff and children encountered near the building.
"We've seen hypodermic needles, we've seen bullets," Urfer said in August 2025. "It's difficult for them to have to walk past an area like that.”
The building's former owner, John Bagrowski, owed $279,000 in property taxes — placing him near the top of the list for the most taxes owed on a brownfield property. When approached in September 2024 and asked how much he owed in property taxes on the building, Bagrowski said he did not know. When told the amount was $279,000, he said "OK."
When asked why property taxes had not been paid since 2011, Bagrowski deflected responsibility.
"It's not my building, it's my wife's so you'll have to talk to her about that," Bagrowski said.
Bagrowski and his wife did not answer when contacted by phone Monday.
Fed up with the lack of progress, Costantini asked Mayor Cavalier Johnson to visit the property himself. Johnson said the situation was exactly the kind the city wants to address.
"When a property owner doesn't make investments in their property, and they just let it sit and rot. We don't want to see that in the City of Milwaukee. That's why I got involved here," Johnson said in August 2025.
Costantini acknowledged the demolition is just a starting point.
"Let's start with one and let's do this one, especially since it's next to a youth center, and then let's work on the others," Costantini said.
The Department of City Development said it "looks forward to identifying an opportunity that supports productive redevelopment of the site."
Costantini hopes the city will allow STRONG to transform the soon-to-be empty lot into green space for some of Milwaukee's most vulnerable children.
"It's a disaster right now, but it will soon look better," Costantini said.
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