LEILA FADEL, HOST:
During his first term, former President Donald Trump rolled out opportunity zones, a program of tax incentives to encourage investment in low-income and distressed communities, communities like some in Detroit, where my team and I have been reporting all week. At the time, there was concern that wealthy investors would see more benefits than local residents. To help us understand how the opportunity zones are or are not working here in Michigan's biggest city, we're joined by Russ McNamara of Detroit Public Radio. Hey, Russ.
RUSS MCNAMARA, BYLINE: Hey, happy to have you here.
FADEL: It's been really interesting being in your city. All right, so let's talk about opportunity zones. Big picture - have they achieved their goal?
MCNAMARA: Well, it's a firm maybe. The Michigan Economic Development Corporation says that since October 1, 2019, there's been nearly $4 billion in private investment in Detroit opportunity zones with a hefty tax incentive of nearly 1 billion. That sounds great, but as Aaron Seybert from the Kresge Foundation says, we just don't know how great.
AARON SEYBERT: We don't know what money has come in. We don't know where it's gone. And we don't know who it's benefited.
FADEL: So you said maybe. Is there a way development in opportunity zones can be measured?
MCNAMARA: Anecdotally, for sure. If you drive around the city, you'll see plenty of construction. Billionaire Dan Gilbert owns dozens of buildings downtown. The rest of the country knows that guy as the owner of the Cleveland Cavaliers. His nearly completed Hudson tower is Detroit's first skyscraper since 1993 and will serve as the new headquarters for General Motors.
FADEL: Now, that's downtown. But what about low-income neighborhoods? Wasn't this program supposed to help spur growth there?
MCNAMARA: Yeah. That takes us to East Village, right next to a wealthier neighborhood in the city. There's a lot of empty space. Developer Matt Temkin with Greatwater Opportunity Capital had been rehabbing Detroit apartment complexes for a few years before opportunity zones even came about. Running out of buildings to fix up, the incentives allowed Temkin and his partners to make the switch to building single-family homes.
MATT TEMKIN: It's, like, just encouraging private investment in these areas and giving a tax benefit for it. It has helped increase the flow of capital to areas that otherwise wouldn't have had it.
MCNAMARA: Right now, in East Village, there are three occupied newly constructed homes, with a few more almost ready to go.
FADEL: Now, Russ, you mentioned a lot of vacant land in that neighborhood. But are people still living there, and are there worries that new development could drive out longtime residents?
MCNAMARA: Yeah. I met Martha Coates. She's the block club president and lives just down the street from the development. This is how she described the neighborhood when she moved in.
MARTHA COATES: The land was actually blight, super blight. And everything has totally changed since then.
MCNAMARA: Yeah. That was 40 years ago. All those homes have been torn down, the vast fields only broken up by a stand of trees that was planted about 15 years ago. If the development continues and East Village continues to grow, Martha does stand to benefit. She owns five parcels of land on her street, something she invested in before opportunity zones, with one lot costing her just $66. She plans on leaving her properties to her seven grandchildren to build that generational wealth, but ideally, she wants something she's never experienced - a thriving neighborhood.
COATES: So for all the lots to be filled in and have children on the block would be amazing to me.
MCNAMARA: And I got to say that for the first time in 65 years, Detroit's population grew in 2023. It was just 1,900 people. But for a city that has watched people leave since its mid-1950s heyday, it's a start.
FADEL: That's Russ McNamara of Detroit Public Radio. Thanks so much, Russ.
MCNAMARA: Thanks a lot. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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