In short, some argue, the capital gains tax benefit folded into the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act tax code overhaul could have been more acutely targeted at U.S. Census tracts where investors may need more of a two-handed shove than a gentle nudge to put cash into things like real estate developments and business investments. In addition, others say more oversight is needed of how the funds are used.

Yet those areas of greater downtown prior to 2017 were teeming with serious, underway development and redevelopment activity ranging from new and redeveloped office buildings to penthouse apartments leasing for thousands of dollars a month to other mixed-use developments.

In Detroit and other cities, that has caused some to argue that the tax benefit provides little more than lip service to helping communities struggling outside of the greater downtown's 7.2 square miles and a handful of other areas like the University District instead of funneling much-needed equity into things like affordable housing and jobs.

"Don't you just love the government?" Dennis Bernard, a metro Detroit real estate expert who is founder of Southfield-based Bernard Financial Group, asked wryly on Sept. 18 when addressing a group of Crain's Detroit Business Detroit Homecoming VI attendees about Opportunity Zones and other real estate-related matters. "When the Opportunity Zones came along, the government decided to use spray paint instead of a brush."

"We are really blessed," Bernard continued. "Most, if not all the action that is going on in the CBD (central business district) and Midtown and going up the spokes are in Opportunity Zones, so not only do you have good fundamentals of real estate, you have Opportunity Zones, which of course is going to help with your equity investors. You gotta just love the way government does things. Look at where the real estate is good, and you're going to have a good chance to find the Opportunity Zones there."

The zones are designated according to U.S. Census tracts where the poverty rate is at least 20 percent and the median household income is less than 80 percent of that in the surrounding areas. The Michigan State Housing Development authority says they are for "low-income communities nationwide that have been cut off from capital and experienced a lack of business growth."

"Although governors are required to nominate low-income census tracts, those tracts should have opportunities for potential investment," MSHDA says in a document on its website. Only up to 25 percent of the eligible census tracts could become Opportunity Zones in any given state. "And clustering census tracts will enhance opportunity. Investors are not likely to invest in high-risk census tracts that have no potential."