DETROIT – Since the UFO Factory in Detroit's Corktown was condemned, the community has rallied around employees left out of work.
A GoFundMe account hit $15,000, and Tuesday it was matched by the company that damaged the building. How is the donation going over? The initial consensus is skepticism, that quickly becomes, 'If you wanted to help this place, why don't you fix that big crack you caused?'
There's no love lost between the UFO Factory and real estate group Soave. The two have tangled in court more than once, and many believe it's because UFO Factory was the lone holdout in Soave's effort to buy up the hot Corktown property.
A construction crew was developing the land around UFO Factory when it hit the foundation, forcing it to be condemned.
"When you lose a place you've put your blood, sweat and tears into, you're losing more than your job," said Erica Pietrzyk, who started the GoFundMe page. "With how badly damaged the building was, it wasn't that they were going to be out of work for a week or two weeks, it's going to take months."
Pietrzyk said she's a little cynical about Soave's $15,000 donation to the cause.
"If they were really trying to do good by remedying their mistake, they'd say, 'Hey we figured out a way to fix your building,' because what the employees want is to go back to work," Pietrzyk said. "They want to have their home again."
Soave didn't want to go on camera Tuesday, but it said the $15,000 was not put into the GoFundMe, but given directly to the owners per their request.
"Them giving $15,000 to try and match is just their way of saying, 'Look how much money we have to spare,'" Pietrzyk said. "Why don't you put that into fixing the building immediately?"
You can watch Jason Colthorp's full story in the video posted above.