Mike Hoque’s office on the 56th floor of the Comerica Bank tower in downtown Dallas looks out onto a patchwork of parking lots, crumbling brick buildings, and empty streets and concrete sidewalks that have long served as a kind of symbolic border between the city’s thriving north and forgotten south. About a decade ago, Hoque began buying up the no man’s land, small parcel by small parcel. It seemed like an easy bet. The fortunes of land adjacent to the downtown of a major American city would inevitably reverse. The only question was when. Hoque’s gamble nearly paid off when executives from Amazon came to town looking for a location for a second headquarters. The corporation shortlisted his property but eventually passed on Dallas. In the meantime, though, Hoque had caught another break. After the passage of President Donald Trump’s tax bill, most of the media attention focused on its steep tax cuts. But a somewhat arcane provision slipped into the legislation caught Hoque’s interest. It provided for the creation of something called “Opportunity Zones.” Click here to read more at www.dmagazine.com.