Detroit pulls 'switcheroo' on companies for demo bids

DETROIT - Charlie LeDuff and Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan have gone round and round for a few weeks now.

Charlie wants to know about how the city is handling your money but the mayor isn't interested in talking; he blames others and practically calls Charlie a liar.

Mayor Mike Duggan held a press conference recently. It's an old trick: when you're in the middle of a political scandal just change the subject! Charlie didn't take the bait and he continues to demand  answers from your mayor.

At issues are the demolition contracts. You know, the ones to take down the city's abandoned buildings. The ones that Duggan handed over to his buddies and the price was negotiated in secret meetings with preferred companies.

Well, there's a new twist. When the bid was posted to other demolition companies who weren't part of those negotiated prices, they had just two days to come up with the insurance for the bid. The insurance was 100% of the $6.5 million job. That's a lot of money in 48 hours, so guess who bid?

The preferred demolition companies had already buddied up to Duggan - some of them had even contributed thousands to the mayor.

Then something weird happened. After the contracts were awarded, the winning companies only had to come up with $2 million in insurance.

That's right. They pulled the old switcheroo.

So Charlie took his evidence to the Mayor during his press conference to change the subject. Charlie still wanted his answers. See what happened in the buffet line by watching the video above.

PLAY THE VIDEOS BELOW TO SEE CHARLIE'S OTHER RECENT REPORTS ABOUT DETROIT'S HOUSING DEMOLITION PROGRAM:

DETROIT'S DEMO DISASTER: A LAND BANK PEYTON'S PLACE?
DETROIT'S DEMO DISASTER, BLAME IT ON THE DIRT:
DETROIT'S DEMO DISASTER: SECRET NEGOTIATIONS WITH CONTRACTORS:
DUGGAN DEFENDS SKYROCKETING DEMO COSTS:

For the rest of Charlie's stories on Detroit's demolition, CLICK HERE>>