General Motors offered deal to stay in Detroit’s Renaissance Center - Detroit News and Information - Crain's Detroit Business

General Motors offered deal to stay in Detroit’s Renaissance Center - Detroit News and Information - Crain's Detroit Business

From Crain's Detroit Business:

In what may be the ultimate irony to anyone who grew up near Detroit in the 1970's, the GM headquarters building the Renaisance Center in downtown Detroit overlooking the Detroit River may become the modern day version of an urban renewal zone.

The Rennaissance Center may become a Renaissance Zone.

If General Motors Corp. wants to stay at Detroit’s Renaissance Center, it’ll
have a powerful incentive — Wayne County Executive Robert Ficano and Detroit
Mayor Dave Bing announced Friday at the Detroit Regional Chamber’s Mackinac
Policy Conference that they’ll offer GM the benefits of a Renaissance Zone to
stay in Detroit.

“We got together and asked what tools we have in our toolbox to tell the rest of the world that we’re really open for business,” Ficano said. The incentives, Ficano said, will not be available just to GM but to any business that wants space at the Ren Cen.

A Renaissance Zone is a powerful tax abatement tool.

“So in their bankruptcy case, they can say now they have a business case to stay at the GM building,” Ficano said. The deal’s been offered to GM, he said, but the company must still make the decision to stay in Detroit.