I will not feel bad if the Financial Guarantee Insurance Company (FGIC) – Detroit’s largest creditor – loses in its bid this coming week to force the sale of some or all of the art at the Detroit Institute of Art (DIA).
Starting Monday, Sept. 29, FGIC will try to convince U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Steven Rhodes that the artwork – valued at roughly $4.3 billion – is actually worth slightly more than $8 billion, and that the city can afford to take the hit.
If FGIC wins in court, there will be, as one person said, a fire sale at the DIA, dragging values down to an estimated $1 billion – maybe.
That happens to be the amount FGIC stands to lose if Judge Rhodes decides FGIC didn’t make its case.
This is a fight FGIC could probably afford to lose. It is an insurance company after all, and it gambled by becoming one of Detroit’s creditors.
The DIA is worth so much more to Detroit than the sum of its parts. It’s a destination point for metro Detroiters and many others from different cities and states, who have supported the institution monetarily and as the gem it is.
I remember being a humanities student at Wayne State University. Our class never met in Old Main, as the class directory stated. We met in the DIA. Why look at slides of paintings, for example, when you can see the originals less than an arms-length away?
There’s also the cretin factor.
Those who have been following Detroit’s bankruptcy case have seen what other cities and states think of Detroit. They’ve said essentially that Detroit’s population is too stupid to realize and enjoy the value of the DIA, a falsehood.
But it’s easy to shoot from the shadows.
I look at it this way – if Detroit’s pensioners are willing to go along with the plan that will kick in when Detroit emerges from bankruptcy, then I should be, too. Those are the people with the real money on the table and they’re not howling for the death of the DIA.
Judge Rhodes shouldn’t let out-of-towners such as FGIC gut such a marvelous institution.
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