Benefit talks have begun over a proposed $1.6 billion reconfiguration of the Detroit Renaissance Center and dozens of acres of riverfront land east of the iconic landmark – and the development team is vowing citywide outreach.
Tuesday night was the first of nearly a dozen planned community benefits meetings through the end of October. General Motors and Dan Gilbert’s real estate firm Bedrock teamed up for the project, kicking off the months-long process with an overview of the plans to remake the 1970s complex and efforts to ensure residents are heard.
The meeting was held ahead of the Aug. 19 opening of a public engagement hub next to the RenCen filled with exhibits and information about the redevelopment proposal. The hub at 521 Atwater will be open to the public for six months and will solicit visitor feedback on what they’d like to see built within the 35-plus acres east of the existing RenCen complex.
Tuesday’s meeting at the Coleman A. Young Municipal Center spanned nearly two-and-a-half hours and was led by Aaron Goodman of Detroit’s Planning and Development Department.
Goodman noted that about 4,600 residents live in the project’s impact area and laid out the process for assembling a nine-member Neighborhood Advisory Council (NAC) to negotiate benefits on behalf of the community with the project developers.
Detroit voters approved the city’s landmark community benefits ordinance in 2016. The law, later amended in 2021, calls for negotiations over jobs, environmental considerations, amenities and other quality of life guarantees for residents in the area impacted by developments that meet a certain threshold, including projects valued at $75 million and above or that receive more than $1 million in tax abatements.
Residents, advocates and other stakeholders weighed in Tuesday with concerns over the project scope and timeline and the need for transit, equitable housing and opportunities for Black-owned businesses.
Representatives of the Community Development Associates of Detroit (CDAD) argued the process is being “rushed” and that the impact area should be citywide due to the historical significance of the RenCen.
“The rushed implementation of this is really our issue. What is the rush?,” Eric Dueweke, a Detroit community organizer and educator with CDAD. “Construction of this isn’t gonna start until after the Final Four and then ramming this through in the summer time doesn’t seem right. It seems like a way to minimize community involvement in the process.”
He added that the impact area of the Renaissance Center is the entire City of Detroit.
“I know, I get it, you can’t have a community benefits process that involves everyone in Detroit,” he said. “What if the impact area was District 5 and District 6? I get it, it’s a lot more work, but it’s the right thing to do.”
Others echoed Duweke’s concern, calling for a broader boundary for the advisory group.
GM and Bedrock officials have shared concepts for attractions like Chicago’s popular Navy Pier, with a Ferris wheel, marina and other amenities along the Detroit River. But the development team stressed that they want the plans to be informed by residents and likely visitors.
City and project officials told attendees that project plans would be inclusive, even after the community benefits talks conclude. Beyond the hub on Atwater, the team and city planning officials touted a “roadshow” that will bring discussions on the RenCen project to all of Detroit’s seven council districts and they encouraged the public to find more information and take a survey online.
Transit advocate Michael Cunningham also addressed the development team Tuesday, urging officials the team to prioritize a benefits agreement that factors in affordable and accessible transportation.
“I want something for transit,” he told planning officials and the development team. “I’ve never seen a community benefit involving public transportation and I think it should now.”
In response to audience pushback about preserving all five buildings, rather than just three, as proposed, Bedrock representative Steve Ogden said the cost to salvage the other two could top $800 million and isn’t something the development team is willing to take on.
Ogden explained to the crowd that the redevelopment would not be a demolition or implosion, it’s “strategic deconstruction.” That process, he said, would include an intensive, year-long process of dismantling the two towers piece-by-piece rather than knocking them down.
Of the preserved towers, one will feature residential, another would include a hotel as well as commercial, mixed-income housing and retail. The other tower would be preserved for future office space, Ogden said.
He said the vision would take the RenCen from “exclusionary to inclusive,” and “from an isolated island into something very accessible to everyone.”
An emotional Beverly Kindle-Walker, a longtime resident and community advocate, tearfully touted the importance of the coveted riverwalk and the RenCen, which she regards as “a signature centerpiece” of the city. She said all of the towers are needed and joined a chorus of attendees Tuesday who spoke out against the proposed vision. Kindle-Walker called the idea “dumb” and told development team members to “leave it like it is.”
Scotty Boman, a member of the Detroit Board of Police Commissioners, said he attended Tuesday as a resident, not in his official role. He too supports keeping the complete RenCen. He said that the building should be restored and that its “occupancy issues are the result of corporate subsidies.”
“Stop incentivizing competing buildings until the Renaissance Center is occupied,” he said.
Jennifer Stallings Dewey, senior counsel for community engagement for GM, said Tuesday that the company has owned the building for 30 years and invested more than $1 billion over time to make it more accessible and inclusive. She noted the removal of a concrete berm along Jefferson Avenue and the addition of a glass atrium and initial phase of the riverwalk.
“But, we came to a point where it became clear that no amount of investment would make this building viable for the future,” she said. “Redevelopment and reimagining the space around it (the RenCen) became the only path forward.”
GM and Bedrock first announced their RenCen redevelopment plan in late 2024, the plan had been in a holding pattern until July, when the state Legislature lifted the financial cap on a key development incentive program that the project would rely on. GM’s global headquarters relocated in January from the RenCen to Bedrock’s new Hudson’s Detroit development.
Bedrock is expected to contribute about $1 billion toward the $1.6 billion project cost, with GM contributing $250 million. The remainder would rely on public financing. The riverfront project would be an additional expense. GM and Bedrock have projected a summer 2027 start for demolition.
At the next community benefits meeting on Sept. 1, nomination and selection will take place for the NAC’s first two members. To qualify, nominees must be residents within the impact area, at least 18 years old and free of conflicts with the development team and the city. Three others will later be appointed jointly by District 5 Council Member Renata Miller and at-large Council Members Mary Waters and Coleman. A Young II. The four remaining members will be appointed by the city’s Planning and Development Department.
The Renaissance Center benefits meetings will be held at 6 p.m. on Tuesdays through Oct. 27. Meeting minutes, future dates and how to attend in-person and online, can be found here.
