Soave Enterprise and the Monahan Co. have donated $15,000 to a Go Fund Me campaign supporting UFO Factory, a popular Corktown bar that was damaged last week by Monahan construction workers hired by Soave.

"As we work to develop a solution to the accidental damage to the UFO Factory, we are pleased to show our support for the UFO Factory and its employees by donating $15,000 to the Go Fund Me campaign," said Pete Van Dyke, a spokesman for Soave Enterprises and The Monahan Co. "Our intention in developing Elton Park is to help bolster the Corktown community, and we hope this donation reflects that goal. We are committed to getting the UFO Factory and Elton Park back on track for Corktown and Detroit."

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A Monahan construction crew was starting work on Elton Park, a $44-million retail and housing development spearheaded by Soave, Wednesday when workers inside of UFO Factory said the building began shaking.

Bartender Kayleigh Rose, 26, of Hamtramck told the Detroit Free Press last week that bottles began to fly off the shelves and the club's bar-length mirror shattered. Daylight was able to creep through what had been a solid, cinder-block wall.

The damage, caused by Monahan construction workers, made the small rock club tip about 15 degrees, owner Dion Fischer told the Detroit Metro Times right after the incident.

The building has since been inspected and deemed too dangerous to occupy, said David Bell, director of Detroit’s Building Safety Engineering and Environmental Department. It leans dangerously and could collapse, according to inspectors, Bell said.

Following the damages, which shut down the bar indefinitely, a Go Fund Me Campaign was set up with a goal price of $15,000 — the amount Soave and Monahan have since donated. In four days, the campaign raised nearly $20,000.

Soave and Monahan are working with the UFO Factory to determine how they want to receive the donation, Van Dyke wrote in an email.

In addition to the online crowdfunding campaign, tonight there is a benefit fundraiser at nearby El Club. The UFO Factory opened in its current location in 2014.

Fisher, the owner of UFO Factory, could not be immediately reached for comment.

Friends and other supporters of the club, however, have spoken out, offended by the donation.

"It also feels like a date rapist who throws cab fare at you. Apologies for sounding dramatic, but these are brutal, brazen tactics, and these are my friends," Mike McGonigal, a local music critic who helped put together the fundraiser and had a monthly Gospel Brunch at the club, wrote in a Facebook message.

"I feel really sick to my stomach hearing that Soave is donating money," he added. "Like many people, I feel pretty attached to the place. I first visited UFO when it was a weird clubhouse in Eastern Market about eight years ago, and the Gratiot space had its very first show on the day I moved to town. I like the place enormously, and am very fond of the owners. They have been so generous with their time in promoting music in this town, and then to me personally in suggesting I do the gospel brunch event there every month."

The developer and the bar recently faced off in court when the UFO Factory sued over the use of land around the bar now owned by the developer. The lawsuit, which was dismissed in April, claimed that land had long been vacant and had been regularly used by the bar's owners and their predecessors for more than 15 years. That, said the lawsuit, allowed the club's owners to claim it as theirs under a centuries-old principle of English common law called "adverse possession."

Contact Allie Gross: aegross@freepress.com