Army Corps of Engineers mobilizing to turn Wisconsin State Fair Park into a hospital for less-serious coronavirus patients

Work has started on creating an overflow facility for coronavirus patients at the Wisconsin State Fair Exposition Center.

Within hours of a request from Wisconsin officials, the Army Corps of Engineers awarded a contract Tuesday night to a Milwaukee construction firm to turn the massive center into a facility that could accommodate hundreds of noncritical patients.

Hospitals currently have enough room to handle people sick with COVID-19. But Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett said the State Fair Park building would be the equivalent of an insurance policy.

“Just as many people buy an insurance policy for their home hoping never to have to use it, that’s what we’re doing here,” Barrett said at a media briefing Thursday afternoon.

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Army Corps of Engineers officials have begun laying out grids for 10-foot-by-10-foot rooms in the expo center that is normally packed with vendors selling beef jerky, hot tubs and cookware during the Wisconsin State Fair each August.

Milwaukee-area hospitals have boosted the total number of beds as well as intensive care beds, but should those all fill up — which has happened in other cities, including New York — State Fair Park would handle coronavirus patients who are not on ventilators or in intensive care, but who are not yet well enough to be home.

Hospitals in Milwaukee County have increased the number of beds from 2,400 to 3,600 and nearly doubled the number of intensive care beds to almost 900 since the outbreak began, said Dr. Ben Weston, director of Medical Services for the Milwaukee County Office of Emergency Management. Plus the county has around 500 ventilators.

Weston said a relatively small number of coronavirus patients require ventilators, but the rough estimates are that for every five hospital beds needed for people sick with COVID-19, one ICU bed will be required for very ill people. So far roughly 60% of ICU patients need ventilators to breathe.

Army Corps of Engineers officials are working on the technical challenges of turning the expo center into a hospital, including making it ADA compliant, figuring out how to set up a negative pressure system where air is pulled up and out of the building, wiring networks for nurses and doctors to monitor patients and installing a system to handle people on oxygen. Plus in- and outpatient systems must be created, as well as bathing facilities and additional toilets.

“You can imagine how complex a hospital is. We’re trying to establish that same thing in the conference center,” said Col. Aaron Reisinger, commander of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Chicago district.

Gilbane Building Co. was awarded the contract to build the facility inside the expo center. Reisinger said Thursday afternoon that construction should begin in two to four days.

Officials did not reveal the cost of turning State Fair Park into a coronavirus overflow facility but said it will be funded by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

They also declined to say how many people the expo center will be able to hold. Reisinger said it took five days to build a 500-bed facility in Chicago’s McCormick Place Convention Center.

Each “room” will have three sides of 8-foot-tall hard walls with a curtain on one end and an open ceiling to  use the existing lighting at State Fair’s Expo Center.

West Allis Mayor Dan Devine said State Fair Park is a good spot because it’s next to the freeway. He also said the coronavirus overflow facility would have a minimal impact on the surrounding neighborhood.

Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele noted that more than 200 cases and 19 additional deaths have been reported in the county since Tuesday and it’s likely the number of people ill with coronavirus will continue to rise.

That’s why an overflow facility is needed, Abele said.

“I will happily accept the criticism if we’re done right now (with cases). But I would feel horribly if we didn’t do this and we’re faced with the specter of people who need health care and have no place to go,” said Abele.

There are also two "isolation" facilities in the county — a state-run facility at the Super 8 on South Howell Avenue near Milwaukee Mitchell International Airport and a locally run facility at Clare Hall on the grounds of the Saint Francis de Sales Seminary.