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The Wapato Jail has officially become the property of Portland developer Marty Kehoe.

Kehoe Northwest Properties has closed on the $5 million sale, with the transaction recorded and money transferred, Multnomah County officials said Thursday.

For now, the site will be leased as a warehouse, Kehoe said. However, he plans to eventually demolish the jail. The property encompasses 18.24 acres of land zoned for industrial use.

鈥淭he location was really good for a warehouse development, and getting 18 acres together at one time was a real opportunity,鈥� he said.

The sale ends an embarrassing and wasteful chapter for the county, which built the jail. It was completed in 2004, with proceeds from a voter-approved bond backed by the sheriff at the time, Dan Noelle. The jail never opened as the county fell short of operating dollars and crime declined.

鈥淭he long saga of Wapato is over,鈥� Deborah Kafoury, chairwoman of the county’s board of commissioners, stated in a news release. 鈥淲e didn’t need it as a jail. We couldn’t afford to convert it. We couldn’t reach back into the past and recapture the money spent. But we could work with professional real estate managers to sell Wapato and get that property back on the tax rolls to bring vital revenue to serve those in our community who need us most.鈥�

The proceeds from the sale will go toward permanent housing, county officials said.

Kehoe’s purchase proceeded even though some people advocated using the site as a homeless shelter. Developer Homer Williams’ Oregon Harbor of Hope nonprofit submitted a $7 million offer with several contingencies.

But county officials said they had studied using the jail as a homeless shelter, and it simply wouldn’t work. The site was too expensive and too far from social services and transit. Furthermore, Oregon’s land-use board denied a previous attempt to operate a mass shelter in an industrial zone.

The county’s board of commissioners on April 12 voted 4-1 to approve the sale, with Commissioner Loretta Smith dissenting. Taxpayers were getting poor value for the property, she said.

Kehoe used a limited liability company, N. Bybee Lake Court, to complete the transaction.