It’s been a very long time coming and a twisty road to get to this point.
The Guilford County Sheriff’s Office is finally moving into its new administrative headquarters at 401 W. Sycamore St. in downtown Greensboro.
Guilford County Sheriff Danny Rogers announced this week that the transition is officially underway and also that – after decades of bouncing between aging buildings and makeshift arrangements – the Sheriff’s Office will soon have a modern centralized home.
According to the announcement from the Sheriff’s Office, the Otto Zenke Building at 400 W. Washington Street will no longer be open to the public after December 8 – and several major divisions will move into the Sycamore Street building in phases. For decades, top Sheriff’s Office leaders have complained mightily about the old deteriorating building that was uneven, subject to flooding, had a snake infestation at one time and there were even stories that the building was haunted.
Those divisions that will be in the new building include the Executive Command Staff, Personnel and Training, Legal Process, Resource Management, Professional Standards, and the Sheriff’s Office legal team.
During the transition, the Legal Process Division might see some delays with concealed-carry appointments and fingerprinting; however, civil-process service and concealed-carry renewal drop-offs will continue without interruption; those services will stay in the courthouse until December 12.
Field operations and detention won’t be affected.
This move marks the end of one of Guilford County’s most contentious construction sagas in many years – a multi-year journey that began with big plans, hit a wall, blew up dramatically and publicly, and ultimately forced Guilford County back to the drawing board.
The long fight centered on the county’s 2023 contract with Samet Corp. to demolish the old downtown jail and build a new sheriff’s headquarters on that same block. The county awarded the contract to Samet in February of that year. The goal was ambitious: Tear down the decaying jail, which had flooded and leaked for years, and finally build the Sheriff’s Office a home that was not the Otto Zenke building and one that didn’t creak, bow or smell bad.
For decades, county commissioners and sheriffs had talked about the need for a modern headquarters. The Samet contract was supposed to be the moment when all that talk became action.
Instead, the project collapsed. Not long after awarding Samet the roughly $23.9 million contract, the Guilford County Board of Commissioners voted unanimously to terminate it. That vote, never fully explained to the public, followed a dispute over MWBE participation – minority- and women-owned business requirements – that spiraled into a full blown breakdown between the county and one of the region’s largest contractors.
According to Samet’s public statements at the time, the company had already secured more than 40 percent MWBE subcontractor participation, including more than 15 percent with Black-owned firms.
Some county officials who spoke off the record to the Rhino Times at the time said that a reprehensible comment by a Samet employee speaking about minority participation in the project led to the unanimous decision by the county to kill the contract even before phase 1 was totally complete.
Samet conducted an internal investigation into offensive comments made by an employee connected to the project. That employee was fired; however, the controversy didn’t end there.
The county never truly explained the mess, conducting all their discussions of the matter in closed-sessions. However, it was very clear to anyone watching that the commissioners believed that Samet had mishandled the situation badly enough that the relationship couldn’t continue.
The unanimous vote by the commissioners made that point. Samet, for its part, called the county’s demand unreasonable, did not rule out a lawsuit, and warned of rising costs and uncertainty for subcontractors.
After canceling Samet’s contract, Guilford County had to rebid the remainder of the project.
Inflation and redesigns left the county’s taxpayers with a much higher price tag. In early 2024, a joint venture led by Blum Construction won the contract at a guaranteed maximum price of about $27 million. That was after the county had already paid out millions to Samet for phase one.
More changes came later: Interior upgrades, added security features, design tweaks and efforts to preserve some materials from the old Zenke building – including wood paneling that commissioners wanted saved – pushed costs higher.
All the while, the Sheriff’s Office continued operating from a hodgepodge of outdated spaces. The Zenke building, which the county bought decades ago rather than build a purpose-built headquarters, was notorious for being dilapidated.
Previous Boards of Commissioners patched it, fixed walls and replaced windows, but the building always seemed one step behind utter deterioration.
Staff often joked that the Sheriff’s Office was spread across so many disconnected facilities that it was hard to remember which department was in which building.
This new headquarters changes that. Once the move is complete, nearly all major administrative and support functions will be under one roof. Training, legal process, command staff, internal affairs, logistics and hiring will be centralized. There will be no more sending applicants to one building for paperwork, another for fingerprints and a third for records.
The county’s hope – and the Sheriff’s Office’s as well – is that the consolidation will cut delays and improve the public’s experience.
Why can’t our government do things the most efficient way. It costs all taxpayers unnecessary $
During my administration we built a jail, a major crimes division, and a substation. We renovated facilities at two other substation, buying one renting the other at minimal cost. We completed renovations at the High Point jail and the Zenke building. We renovated the training facility at the department range as well as the facilities at the county farm. We were able to do all that and still maintain a 66% reduction in crime. We did it because the sheriffs office used its own talent to focus on getting the taxpayer more bang for their dollar. No drama, no cost overruns. The county deserves better than what they are getting under the present administration. Captain Phil Byrd was part of the success we enjoyed. We need someone who knows how a sheriff office should be operated. Phil is someone who does.
Amen Mr. Barnes! I would love to hear the initial capitalization vs. the final numbers.
Mr. Barnes, former Sheriff, I believe you did a good job for Guilford County, but something happened as you lost the election to a high school graduate, that had been let go by you and another Law Enforcement Agency, and had a prior criminal record, suits against him, etc..
It also doesn’t look proper that you are endorsing a candidate as you are a “Commissioner with the Training and Standards Division” over Sheriffs. You know that is not ethical or morally right. It could also disqualify that candidate, so you should cease the endorsements.
Sheriff Barnes lost his last election because of the change of the Electorate, and the lack of voter participation.
Anyone is free to express their opinion on this forum. It’s called the 1st Amendment.
You are correct, anyone can express their opinion, unless you are in a position that oversees a “Political elected position” .
Exactly, the lack of Republicans going out to vote turned the tide and we are suffering from it for almost 8 years. Hopefully Republicans will show up in February, March and November so we can fix the problems, or we will have another 4 years of crap.
Wishing and hoping does not make it so. Most folks have given up, or have no interest in being involved. So perhaps 18% of the electorate gave us the new City Council.
A “Commissioner with the Training and Standards Division” has no authority over a Sheriff anywhere in the state. They are merely part of a committee that sets minimum standards for Deputy & Detention Officer certification and performs audits that make recommendations to Sheriff’s on their hiring & training practices as well as hold quarterly hearings for those souls who have been accused of violating those certification standards.
Was your administration faced with a commissioner who cried DEI, racism and caused our tax dollars to increase due to this behavior by our county commissioners as the present administration was? How does endorsement of a sheriff candidate have anything to do with this article?
Typical….Skip’s involvement, higher price and tax payers screwed. I wonder when the needed repairs will start?
What will now be done with the Zenke Bldg?
Alice, the Zenke building will be demolished and replaced with a parking lot.
Oh, thank You. We need another parking lot in the City; or make work for the faithful.
why do they need buildings ? work out of vehicles that can be relocated quickly with all the comms, computer, weapons. lunch pail law enforcers need. < paper pushing pushers
So here we are getting a new sheriff’s headquarters, just a couple years late and almost 4 million taxpayers dollars later because skip played the race card against Samet Construction Co. skip wanted to add more black
sub contractors after the bids were opened. Got his racist feeling hurt. Word from a person with Samet was it was a relative or close friend of skips who didn’t get the sub bid.
I heard a different story. Remember, the vote to kill the contract was unanimous. So every member of the board felt there was a good reason to do so.
Yes- because Skip said so. Just my opinion.
I’m curious about the story you heard Scott. Samet’s employees were told not to speak publicly about it a commissioner has said the same thing about them. What’s the big secret
I heard that county officials heard some part of a conversation on the phone they were not supposed to hear and what they heard was so egregious that they could not overlook it. I also heard from a commissioner that Samet was not open and honest with the commissioners several times and the commissioners felt they had to kill contract. I don’t know if that is the case or not but I do agree with the county commissioners that the unanimous vote says something. If the county’s decision was not justified, I don’t think the nine of them would have been in complete agreement.
Thanks Scott. As always there are two sides to a story and usually the truth is somewhere in the he middle