Crain's Detroit Business

12/15/2025

New water infrastructure at the Detroit Zoo. A renovation of Canton Township's recreation center. Money for Flint, following the water crisis. Funding for the Motown Museum, the Zekelman Holocaust Center in Farmington Hills and BAMF Health's expansion into Detroit.

Those are among more than 200 earmarks in the 2024-25 state budget that appear to have been eliminated or reduced following House Republicans' cancellation of "work projects," unspent funds that Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer's administration had planned to carry into the 2025-26 fiscal year.

The rare move last week angered grant recipients and Democrats who enacted the spending in 2024 — when they controlled the now-split Legislature — and left lawmakers, state departments, grantees, their lobbyists and others scrambling the following day amid widespread confusion over the scope of the $645 million in disapproved funding and whether that figure is even correct.

Read more here: https://www.crainsdetroit.com/politics-policy/detroit-zoo-motown-museum-lose-funding-michigan-cuts?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=soc-own

12/15/2025

There’s no good time for a scandal like the one the University of Michigan is facing, but this moment, in particular, is an especially bad one.

UM’s firing Wednesday of head football coach Sherrone Moore over "an inappropriate relationship" with a staff member and subsequent criminal charges against him come on the heels of a steady stream of disruption at the elite school.

It also comes as the university operates under an interim president and follows a string of issues that cast the institution in a negative spotlight and on a national scale.

They include then-offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach Matt Weiss allegedly stealing the personal information of more than 40 college athletes and hacking into their personal photos and videos; the Connor Stalions football sign-stealing scheme to illegally scout future opponents and the removal of Mark Schlissel as president in 2022 over his inappropriate relationship with an employee.

Outside of athletics, there has been controversy over student protests and encampments over politics, DEI and the Israel-Gaza war. Federal cases involving University of Michigan students from China alleged surveilling a military exercise, smuggling biological pathogens across U.S. borders and illegally voting in the 2024 election.

Read more here: https://www.crainsdetroit.com/education/um-has-seen-plenty-scandals-one-could-be-toughest?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=soc-own

12/13/2025

The University of Michigan is producing more startup companies than ever before. The problem? About half of all of its spinouts are leaving Michigan.

Not only that, but they are finding bigger success out of state than the UM spinouts in-state.

UM startups that leave created more than 4,300 jobs and saw venture capital and liquidity events totaling $3.6 billion, according to a 2023 report from Detroit-based ID Ventures. The companies that stayed created 2,300 jobs and saw $1.4 billion in venture capital and liquidity events.

The pattern reveals what insiders say is a fundamental flaw: while Michigan can create new and innovative companies, the state lacks the resources needed for startups to scale — capital, talent and infrastructure. Founders are forced to make the choice: move and grow, or stay and stagnate.

Read more here: https://www.crainsdetroit.com/technology/university-michigan-keeps-losing-startups-it-creates?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=soc-own

12/12/2025

Ford Motor Co. is planning a new 1.5 million-square-foot parts warehousing and logistics plant and 160 new jobs near Monroe, kitty corner to a similar plant built for the automaker a few years ago.

InSite Real Estate LLC plans to develop the mammoth warehouse for the Dearborn-based automaker to lease on a long-term basis, company representatives told Frenchtown Township officials Tuesday. The project represents a $195 million capital investment.

The nine-member Frenchtown Township board voted unanimously this week to approve an Industrial Facilities Tax Exemption for the project, providing a 12-year, 50% tax abatement on real property. Kelli Murphy, state and local tax attorney for Ford, told board members that the abatement was necessary to be cost-competitive with other locations, especially in surrounding states where taxes are lower.

The sprawling structure would be built on 173 acres of farmland on the east side of N. Telegraph Road, south of Buhl Road and north of N. Stoney Creek Road. It is near the old Nike Missile Base site where Ford operates another large warehouse built by InSite in 2021.

Construction of the new warehouse would start in the spring, with operations commencing by 2028. Stephanie Fries, regional director of government relations for Ford, said the proposed building would not house electric vehicle batteries.

Read more here:

Ford Motor Co. is planning a new 1.5 million-square-foot parts warehousing and logistics plant and 160 new jobs near Monroe.

12/11/2025

While controversy stirs around OpenAI’s Stargate data center project in Saline Township, another data center complex nearly as big is being quietly planned 45 miles northeast in Lyon Township.

A company called Verrus — started by Sidewalk Infrastructure Partners, a company backed by Google parent company Alphabet Inc. among other investors — has submitted plans to construct 1.8 million square feet of data centers on the 172-acre lot owned by Detroit-based construction giant Walbridge, according to a proposal that went before the township Planning Commission.

The property is off Grand River Avenue between South Hill and Milford roads in the New Hudson area south of I-96 in southwestern Oakland County.

Walbridge is expected to develop the project — called Project Flex — for Verrus, a subsidiary of Sidewalk Infrastructure Partners founded in 2024 that plans to develop energy-efficient data centers.

No investment total is listed in documents for the project, which consists of the construction of six 306,000-square-foot data center buildings and a power substation designed by DTE.

Lyon Township’s planning commission conditionally approved the site plan for the project in September. Verrus, along with design consulting firm Kimley-Horn and Walbridge, is required to submit a sound study on the project to ensure the data center complies with the township’s noise ordinances. Data centers are often considered loud because of whirling fans used to chill the servers and from diesel generators used in backup emergency situations.

To date, the developers have not submitted that study.

Read more here: https://www.crainsdetroit.com/economic-development/verrus-data-center-planned-lyon-township?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=soc-own

12/11/2025

The Interstate 375 project is gaining stakeholder support after facing criticism.

Project partners, including the Michigan Department of Transportation, the city of Detroit, Downtown Detroit Partnership and the Kresge Foundation, announced a new approach to the project at a meeting last month: splitting construction into two main phases.

Work on filling in the sunken interstate in downtown Detroit was supposed to begin this fall, but MDOT announced this summer it was putting the project on pause.

The new bifurcated approach to the boulevard construction “mitigates a number of concerns” from stakeholders, Eric Larson, CEO of the DDP, told Crain’s.

The revised proposal for the project starts at the southernmost point of I-375. Construction is underway on a storm sewer outfall to the Detroit River south of Jefferson Avenue. That work is expected to be completed by the last weekend of May 2026.

Pending federal approval, MDOT will begin filling in the freeway in 2027 and 2028 to construct a new surface-level street between Gratiot and Jefferson avenues. It will also begin reconstructing the bridge at Gratiot Avenue over the Dequindre Cut.

Approximately 8.8 acres of land will be made available for development from the second phase of the project — the filling in of the sunken interstate — which is expected to be completed in 2027 or 2028.

The last phase of the project is a redesign of the I-75 interchange with I-375 and Gratiot Avenue, for which MDOT has set a potential timeline of 10 to 15 years before it is completed.

Read more here: https://www.crainsdetroit.com/transportation/revised-i-375-plan-gets-good-marks-former-critics?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=soc-own

12/10/2025

Construction on the first of 10 proposed projects in the Ilitch family's and billionaire Stephen Ross' District Detroit is on deck for the spring.

Work on a 313-unit student and faculty housing building for the University of Michigan Center for Innovation should start between March and May, and is expected to be complete in 2028.

The timeline was unveiled Tuesday during a Community Benefits Ordinance update required of Detroit-based Olympia Development of Michigan and New York City-based Related Cos., the company founded by Ross, a Detroit native.

The current iteration of the District Detroit development vision, anchored by the new UMCI graduate school building, was revealed in November 2022.

In response to an audience question about why Olympia and Related haven’t been able to start development on their vision sooner, Keith Bradford, president of Olympia Development of Michigan and the District Detroit, said “development in Detroit is difficult” due to a variety of factors ranging from materials and labor costs to interest rates and raising capital.

Read more here: https://www.crainsdetroit.com/real-estate/district-detroit-build-um-apartment-tower-spring-2026?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=soc-own

12/09/2025

A Frank Lloyd Wright-designed home in Kalamazoo County is back on the market for $1.44 million, an $806,000 cut from its original asking price after failing to sell during post-election real estate turbulence.

Gloria Poore and Benjamin Harroll on Dec. 5 relisted the David and Christine Weisblat House built in 1951 in The Acres subdivision in Charleston Township near Galesburg.

Poore and Harroll initially listed it at $2.25 million in January 2025, then cut the price three times when it didn’t sell.

Now, they’ve hired Victoria Krause Schutte, of Christie’s International Real Estate in Oak Park, Ill., who has brokered four or five Wright home sales during the past few years.

She helped Poore and Harroll settle on the lower price and a new marketing strategy that involved shooting new photos and video and targeting a wider audience.

The Weisblat House is one of four Wright-designed Usonian homes built in the 1950s in a nearly 70-acre subdivision Wright devised called The Acres, about 11 miles east of Kalamazoo. The others are the Eppstein House, Pratt House and Meyer House.

Read more here:

A Frank Lloyd Wright-designed home in Kalamazoo County is back on the market for $1.44 million.

12/09/2025

The owners of the Siren Hotel downtown are in hot water after they defaulted on a multimillion-dollar state loan.

Affiliates of New York City-based Ash NYC Inc. were hit with a nearly $4.15 million judgement after failing to repay the state's Michigan Strategic Fund for a $3.5 million Community Revitalization Program performance-based loan awarded in 2015 for the hotel project.

That’s according to a briefing memo for the Michigan Strategic Fund, which signed off on a collection strategy for the loan on Tuesday.

Ash NYC redeveloped the former Wurlitzer Co. building into the 106-room boutique Siren Hotel in March 2018 in a $22 million project.

Read more here: https://www.crainsdetroit.com/real-estate/siren-hotel-developer-didnt-repay-35m-state-loan?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=soc-own

12/09/2025

Michigan’s legal w**d industry suffered a major blow Monday in its legal battle against a new 24% wholesale tax on cannabis.

Michigan Court of Claims Judge Sima Patel ruled against the Michigan Cannabis Industry Association in denying its request for an injunction and effectively cleared the way for the tax to take effect on Jan. 1.

In her ruling, Patel agreed with the state's argument that adding a tax does not change ma*****na laws.

“The court finds insupportable plaintiffs’ argument … that the Michigan Regulation and Taxation of Ma*****na Act (MRTMA) is the sole method by which to tax regulated ma*****na in Michigan and that the 24% wholesale excise tax could only be enacted through an amendment to the MRTMA passed by a supermajority,” Patel wrote in her ruling.

Nothing in the voter-passed law, she said, requires that “all other taxes” imposed on ma*****na be effectuated by an amendment to that law. Rather, the Legislature imposed another tax through the road-funding law.

The new wholesale tax was written into House Bill 4951, which was passed 78-21 in the Republican-led House and 19-17 in the Democratic-controlled Senate — short of the supermajority threshold in both chambers.

But Patel did leave a window for the industry.

Read more here: https://www.crainsdetroit.com/cannabis/new-michigan-w**d-tax-will-go-effect-jan-1-after-judges-ruling?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=soc-own

12/08/2025

The state’s tallest building would have to close on a temporary basis should demolition commence as envisioned on a pair of Renaissance Center towers after the 2027 NCAA Men's Final Four on April 3 and April 5.

The need to shutter the Detroit Marriott at the Renaissance Center comes because “it cannot be occupied during that process” as the riverfront complex’s five-story podium and retail area would be removed, and the 39-story 300 and 400 towers on the water are razed and infrastructure work takes place, said Jared Fleisher, CEO of Dan Gilbert’s Detroit-based Bedrock LLC real estate development company.

The prospective timing of the closure means the hotel’s roughly 1,300 rooms would remain available for the huge crowds expected that weekend.

Shovels are then expected to start work on an ambitious vision for repurposing the Renaissance Center spearheaded by Bedrock and General Motors Co., which owns five of the seven buildings that make up the bulk of the 5.5 million-square-foot complex developed in the 1970s and 1980s.

For years, Detroit's convention and tourism industry has argued that the city's downtown core and surrounding areas are underserved by hotels, which is causing it to lose revenue to other cities with more robust stock.

The temporary shuttering of the RenCen hotel would be a blow to that ecosystem, although there are other hotels coming online in the interim that should help dull the pain, including the 600-room JW Marriott under construction on the former Joe Louis Arena site and the 227-room luxury Edition hotel at Hudson’s Detroit.

Read more here: https://www.crainsdetroit.com/real-estate/renaissance-center-marriott-would-shutter-during-overhaul?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=soc-own

12/08/2025

Like many metro Detroit communities, a drive down the residential streets of Hazel Park can feel like deja vu. Street after street of pre- and postwar ranch and bungalow homes dot the landscape of the working class city in southeastern Oakland County.

But the so-called “Bottle House” definitely stands out.

While still a flat, ranch-style home like many that surround it, the upwards of 20,000 glass bottles embedded in the structure — “creating a time capsule of 1930s Detroit, per the home’s owner and developer — are hard to miss.

Bought in 2021 by Bloomfield Hills-based investor Carl Schiller from a family that had owned the home for more than 60 years, the interior did not have the same interesting design characteristics, leading to a gut, “down to the studs” renovation that now resembles new construction inside.

Schiller listed the 1,225-square-foot, two-bedroom home for sale last weekend at an asking price of $350,000, or about $285 per square foot.

That’s at the high end for Hazel Park, but Schiller says a handful of nearby new-construction homes have fetched similar prices.

Read more here: https://www.crainsdetroit.com/real-estate/funky-hazel-park-bottle-house-sale-fully-modern-interior?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=soc-own