the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
May 13, 2013
Low-income residents of downtown Detroit are being pushed out of their apartments for a land grab aimed at building a new hockey arena.
What’s more, if the wealthy “pizza-pizza” Ilitch family has their way, taxpayers of the State of Michigan will “own” the new arena!
Taxpayers already own Detroit’s Cadillac Place office building–formerly General Motors headquarters–through a transfer of ownership to the Michigan Strategic Fund in June 2011.
A New York investment bank, First Southwest, which specializes in public finance of sports arenas, has been in discussions with state legislators, according to Crain’s Detroit.
An e-mail from the Michigan Economic Development Corp. (MEDC) detailed $2 million in arena project funding to come from the City of Detroit and $2 million from Wayne County.
According to Crain’s, the Ilitch family is “interested in the state, through the Michigan Strategic Fund, owning a new hockey arena for the Ilitch-owned Detroit Red Wings....”
According to journalist Neil deMause, author of the book Field of Schemes, a look at public funding for sports stadiums, “If the state owns the building, presumably [the Ilitches] don’t have to pay property taxes. That’s huge.”
The State of Michigan IS HELPING the wealthy Ilitches avoid paying taxes to the debt-burdened City of Detroit while NOT HELPING displaced Detroiters to have new affordable housing–business as usual in Michigan!