The federal government has signed a five-year contract with private prison company GEO Group that will nearly double Colorado’s immigrant detention capacity to 2,720 beds.

Signed July 9, the contract comes a year after the Trump administration told Colorado’s congressional delegation it planned to reopen the shuttered Hudson Correctional Facility as an immigration detention center.

The deal is worth up to $528.6 million, federal contracting records show.

Located about 30 miles northeast of Denver in Weld County, the Hudson Correctional Facility is a medium-security prison that closed a decade ago.

The prison is operated by the GEO Group while the Highlands REIT Inc. — a real estate investment firm — owns it.

“We expect that our company-leased Big Horn Facility in Colorado will play an important role in helping meet the need for increased federal immigration processing center bedspace,” George C. Zoley, GEO’s chief executive officer and founder, said in a statement.

Geo has had a 40-year public-private partnership with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

The prison was built in 2009 and held inmates from Alaska until 2014, when it was closed. It has space for about 1,188 inmates — that represents about 60% of the town’s total population.

In its proposal to ICE, GEO said the facility has four housing units that can separately accommodate different detainee populations, including men and women.

The facility, GEO has said, could “depending on urgency” and the specifics, begin accepting detainees “in a matter of months.” They also reported that the facility has been “very well maintained.”

The Geo Group also runs the Aurora Contract Detention Facility, which has a capacity of 1,532 people.

Rather than comment, Hudson Town Manager Bryce Lange directed The Denver Gazette to a two-page community information update on the detention facility released Monday.

“Town leadership recognizes that residents have strong and deeply personal views about immigration detention facilities,” the update said, noting the federal government and not the town is authorizing the contract.

Officials also communicated to residents that the town does not know “several important details” including the operational timeline, the number of detainees and facility staffing or demand projections.

An emailed request to Mayor Joe Hammock and the city council went unanswered.

ICE officials also did not respond.

In a previous statement to The Denver Gazette, ICE officials had said the need for additional bedspace was driving expansion decisions.

“U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s enhanced enforcement operations and routine daily operations have resulted in a significant number of arrests of criminal aliens that require greater detention capacity,” an ICE spokesperson had said in a statement.

ICE, the spokesperson, added last year, “is exploring all options to meet its current and future detention requirements.”

Located on the front range, the city is named for the town company, Hudson City Land and Improvement Co.

The ACLU of Colorado condemned the move, calling it “a profound betrayal of Colorado’s values.”

“ICE’s covert opening of the Hudson facility is another disgraceful and shameful example of the Trump administration’s anti-immigrant fanaticism,” Olivia Mendoza, ACLU of Colorado executive director, said in a statement. 

“ICE has resisted oversight and accountability for decades. Instead of reining in the agency, both Congress and the Trump administration have poured unprecedented amounts of money into fulfilling the campaign’s mass detention and deportation agenda.”

The GEO Group has faced scrutiny at several of its immigration detention facilities, including Aurora.

Earlier this year, a coalition of advocacy groups alleged detainees at GEO’s Aurora facility faced inadequate medical care, poor living conditions and insufficient food. The Department of Homeland Security has called the allegations “false.”

In Washington state, officials sued the company after alleging it repeatedly refused to allow health inspectors into its Tacoma detention center despite a state law requiring access.

In February, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected GEO’s bid to immediately appeal a Colorado lawsuit alleging detainees at its Aurora facility were forced to perform janitorial work and other jobs for little or no pay. The lawsuit is still pending.

Last year, the ACLU of Colorado sued ICE to obtained records of the government’s plans for expanding its detention capacity in the state.

ICE documents obtained by the ACLU in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) show federal officials had considered at least six potential sites to expand ICE’s footprint in Colorado.

At one point, federal officials had considered the Cheyenne Mountain Center and the Colorado Springs Migrant Detention Facility — both in Colorado Springs — as a potential immigration detention sites.

According to agency documents, the GEO Group operates 18 facilities across the country that are under contract to provide services for ICE. With Hudson, which will be called the Big Horn Facility, those facilities will have a capacity of nearly 23,000.

Headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, the GEO Group operates private prisons and mental health facilities in seven U.S. states, Australia, South Africa and the United Kingdom.

The Associated Press and Denver Gazette Reporter Kyla Pearce contributed to this report.