Detroit developer backs Belle Isle 'Freedom City' plan, cites taxpayer flight from high-tax cities

DETROIT, July 26. Sixty-eight percent of likely Detroit voters back the concept of special economic freedom zones, a Michigan developer told Fox News Digital, citing the figure as grounds to convert the city's 982-acre Belle Isle into a self-governing district free of local income and investment taxes. Rodney Lockwood, board chairman of the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, also warned that progressive-led cities including New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco face structural trouble as taxpayers migrate to lower-cost states.

The Belle Isle proposal

Lockwood's plan calls for private investors to purchase or lease the island in the Detroit River, roughly 140 acres larger than New York City's Central Park, and build a mixed-use residential, retail and commercial district. Belle Isle is currently leased to the State of Michigan under a 30-year agreement signed in 2013 and operates as a state park.

The project targets 50,000 permanent residents across 20,000 households, with Lockwood projecting $50 billion in private investment drawn by limited regulation and a tax structure exempting both labor income and capital investment from local taxation. The Mackinac Center, a free-market advocacy organization, backs the concept. A poll by Michigan pollster Steve Mitchell found 51% of likely statewide voters also approved the freedom zone idea.

Detroit's population decline

Detroit held 1.85 million residents in 1950, a period when Lockwood described the city as the world's richest. That count stands at roughly 600,000 today, placing Detroit among the poorest cities in the United States. COVID-era federal relief funds that sustained city budgets have run out, he said.

"Detroit is stuck," Lockwood told Fox News Digital. "Its population has struggled to rebound, and it faces a looming fiscal issue."

Taxpayer migration and the high-tax city problem

A National Taxpayers Union Foundation study released April 7, 2026 found taxpayers are leaving high-tax environments for states including Texas, Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee. Texas surpassed Florida in 2022 as the leading destination, adding one new taxpayer every 4 minutes and 40 seconds, according to the NTUF's "Migration in Minutes" metric.

Lockwood pointed to progressive-led cities including New York, Chicago, Boston and Los Angeles as places facing taxpayer flight driven by high state and local taxes, crime concerns and cost-of-living pressure. He named New York City progressive Zohran Mamdani as a representative of a movement whose answer, Lockwood said, is always "more taxes and more free stuff."