DETROIT – Detroit's Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr wants creditors to come to Detroit next Wednesday to take a bus tour and see the real problems in the city.
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About 40 bondholders, insurers and creditors from around the country are invited to a four-hour tour of the city.
The plan is to have the creditors ride on a DDOT bus to get the true feel of a day in the life of a Detroiter.
They'll start downtown at Grand River, travel to Brightmoor and other blighted areas.
The tour will point out the city's 31,000 structures on the dangerous buildings list and tax delinquency. The city's share of uncollected taxes last year was $131 million -- an amount equal to 12 percent of Detroit's general fund budget.
Last month, Orr stopped paying the city's unsecured creditors and would like to shave down $11.4 billion in claims to about $2 billion.
Orr hopes that by giving the creditors a first-hand experience of Detroit, it will create empathy and leverage negotiations, helping the city avoid filing the largest municipal bankruptcy in history.
Meanwhile, Orr's critics are offering him a one-way ticket out of town.
The Coalition For Detroit's Independence (CDI) strongly supports ending non-democratic rule in Detroit.
The CDI will be celebrating Independence Day with a protest at 9 a.m. in front of the Westin Book Cadillac Hotel in downtown Detroit.
The hotel is Orr's current home.
The CDI lead protest is in effort to evict Orr and Roy Roberts from office and restore democratic freedom to Detroit.