Brno will announce an architectural competition for the design of the former prison

The city will also wait to see if the Ministry of Culture declares the prison complex a cultural monument, as requested by the National Heritage Institute. If the remediation work, the survey, or the ministry's decision is delayed, the announcement of the competition will also be postponed, said Hollan.

The building of the former prison is deteriorating, so the city is carrying out emergency remediation work costing more than five million crowns since February, even before starting the project for the creative center, which is estimated to cost over 400 million crowns. The aim is to prevent the roof from collapsing and water from leaking into the building. The architectural-historical survey will be crucial for the future project, as it will indicate what structural interventions can be made. It is expected to be completed in April. The ministry's decision will also be important, because if the building is declared a cultural monument, the costs of the work could increase by tens of millions of crowns, according to Hollan. Ministry of Culture spokesperson Simona Cigánková told ČTK that it is still unclear when the ministry will decide, as the process is extremely complex.

The city's approach does not please historian Pavel Paleček. According to him, supporters of the creative center began remediation of the building without a single page of the architectural-historical survey. Paleček pointed out that a wooden stage built by political prisoners was removed from the chapel and that the place of execution has yet to surface in the prison, which may be the second thing that ends up in the landfill after the stage.

Hollan disagrees with Paleček. "In the past, a private owner purchased part of the prison from Cejl street, which was demolished and turned into a hostel. Nobody objected to that back then. It is possible that the site of execution was in that part and is long gone. If the interests of the professional community were so intense, they should have appeared back then. Now, it is just an attempt to prevent the city from safely making the area accessible," said Hollan.

The National Heritage Institute oversees the matter on behalf of the Ministry of Culture. According to its Brno director Zdeněk Váchy, the remediation work is within legal limits and does not interfere with the building's essence, which will be addressed only with the project's question for the creation of the center.

The prison was established in the 1770s. It was home to the poet Petr Bezruč, and in 1953, the Brno mayor from the occupation era, Oskar Judex, died there. It ceased operations in 1956 when it was replaced by a new prison in Bohunice.