The manager of the jail project admits the county made a mistake while buying almost $2 million worth of property.

Just this week, the Eau Claire City Council denied the county’s request to rezone land it bought for the jail expansion project, killing the jail expansion plans.

Now, we’ve learned the county never had to actually buy the land the jail was going to sit on. And it had to do with contingencies.

Anyone who’s bought a home likely had a contingency on the sale. The most common being a home inspection. You agree to buy the house, unless a problem comes up in the inspection. That’s the contingency.

But, as we learned Thursday, the county could have asked the people who owned the property it bought to make the $1.9 million worth of sales contingent on the city passing the jail project rezoning request. Apparently no one at the county knew that.

In 2008, Eau Claire County bought 14 properties for the jail expansion project and paid $1.9 million. But, according to the city, it didn’t have to buy the lots and houses.

Darrell Tufte, Director of Community Development for the city of Eau Claire, told us he talked to Mel Erickson, the county’s Director of Planning. Tufte says he explained the county’s three options.

1. Buy the properties outright.
2. Ask the city to rezone the property on its own.
3. Agree with the property owners to make the sales conditional on the passing of the rezoning request, which Tufte says many developers have done in the past.

We talked to Mel Erickson Thursday evening. He told us he doesn’t remember that conversation, but doesn’t deny that it may have happened.

"They shouldn't have purchased that property until they knew it could have happened,” said County Board Member Ken Fulgione.

Because he's a realtor, Fulgione is very familiar with contingencies. He says after he was elected to the board, he brought that point up before the board.

"I stood up and did the real estate 101,” he said. “That says you don't have to buy it. "

But, it was too late. 14 of the properties had already been sold and the money spent.

Project Manager Frank Draxler declined to go on camera. But, he told us “it didn't arise during the early process of buying the properties. In hindsight, perhaps we should have used it. At this point, if you want to talk to the property owners, whether they would have accepted it, I'm not sure."

For now, the county has 14 pieces of what some call prime real estate near the river that it can’t use to build a jail.

The cost? $1.9 million.

Eau Claire County Board Chair Gregg Moore, as well as Assistant County Attorney Tim Sullivan declined to go on camera for this story.

Both said they would not do an interview before they talked to the county’s Attorney, Keith Zehms, who’s on vacation. They also declined to try and reach him Thursday afternoon.

Moore told us now is the time for the city and county to come together.

As for the properties, Fulgione says he believes at some point they can be sold to recover the $1.9 million that was spent. As for the entire jail project, Fulgione says the County Board now has to step back and decide what to do next.