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General Motors this week plans to ask one or both of Detroit's pension funds to invest in the Renaissance Center, its world headquarters in downtown Detroit.

GM executives are expected to make an investment pitch to the city's Police and Fire Retirement System at 9 a.m. Thursday. GM also is trying to schedule a meeting with the city's General Retirement System to seek help in financing about 80 percent, or $500 million, of the value of the corporate-owned building, as reported by The Detroit News today.

GM spokesman Tom Wilkinson wouldn't confirm the exact amount but said the figure was "in the ballpark."

Wilkinson said the search for a Renaissance Center investor began in May when GM's previous lease expired and the company bought the building for $636 million. In this financial climate "the market for these sorts of deals is obviously tough."

Detroit Mayor Ken Cockrel Jr. "has some concerns and wants to look at the specifics," of any Detroit general and/or police-fire retirement system loans to GM, Cockrel's communications director Dan Cherrin said Tuesday afternoon.

"But the mayor said that ultimately it is up to the pension boards to make that decision," Cherrin said.

Pension funds often include real estate as part of their portfolios, and the local funds have invested a reported $24 million in the Westin Book Cadillac Hotel, which re-opened Monday in downtown Detroit.

GM said it does not plan to leave the Renaissance Center, saying that its corporate tenancy makes the landmark building an attractive investment for the funds, or any other investor.

Wilkinson said the money raised would go toward the roughly $4 billion that GM wants to raise by selling assets. Those assets are a part of a $15 billion liquidity plan that GM announced in July.

But Wilkinson said that GM would be seeking investors for the Renaissance Center regardless of the liquidity plan.

"We would be looking to do this whether it was a period of great profits or not great profits," Wilkinson said. "This is just standard procedure."

The Detroit 3 face cash crises that threaten their solvency in the face of dismal sales and a frozen credit market.

Amy Wilson and Robert Ankeny contributed to this report