The fate of Queensland’s Centre for Resilience, the $400 million quarantine facility at Pinkenba, has finally been decided.

The federal government has today announced plans to convert the empty hub into a police training facility, squashing hopes of using the Pinkenba site for emergency housing.

The state government had offered $10 million to help convert the 500-bed facility into crisis housing, but the federal government had consistently pushed back, saying the centre was too far from necessary services.

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Instead, the centre, which has sat empty since it was finished in October 2022, will be taken over by the Australian Federal Police and used as a training facility.

State housing minister Meaghan Scanlon said the decision was disappointing given the time and work put in to see it converted to housing, but ultimately conceded that it was always a federal decision.

Brisbane Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner described the call as “demoralising” and told ABC Radio he was “just devastated”.

“Maybe they need federal police training facilities, but we need crisis accommodation more urgently than that,” Schrinner said. “I know there are reasons why Pinkenba is not necessarily ideal, but it is not ideal for people to be living in tents, in parks and in cars. This is heartbreaking.”