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Kalamazoo Passes "Innovative" City Budget

Andy Robins
/
WMUK

Kalamazoo's new city budget includes the first fruit of a $70-million private gift. City commissioners approved the $148-million spending plan Tuesday night. It includes a big reduction in property tax rates, thanks to the gift from business owners Bill Johnston and William Parfet announced last year. The city's millage rate will fall from over 19-mills in 2016 to only 12-mills this year, a reduction of 37-percent.

The gift allowed the city to create the "Endowment for Excellence" while it stablizes its budget over the next three years. City officials hope to build on that by raising $500 million in other donations to create a permanent endowment by 2019. They hope all of the new money will help improve Kalamazoo's quality of life with a focus on reducing poverty in the city.

The budget approved Tuesday night includes money for 62 new positions. They include new Public Safety officers and employees at the city's Department of Public Services. The city will also hire a director to run the Endowment for Excellence and another staff member who will work on youth development programs.

Kalamazoo City commissioners will hold a special meeting on Monday, January 23, to talk about a process for allocating the new money. Much of it will go toward dealing with needs and issues identified during the "Imagine Kalamazoo 2025" initiative in 2016. It asked residents for input on where the city should focus its resources.

Kalamazoo Vice-Mayor Don Cooney says the 2017 budget is "innovative" in many ways. But he says the city is still dealing with years of budget cuts. Cooney says Kalamazoo now has about 300 fewer city employees than it did when he first joined the city commission. He says that has a big effect on the city's ability to provide the services residents want and expect.

Although the city will hire new employees as part of the new budget, it's payroll will still be slightly smaller than it was the year before. The city will have 600 workers, 48 fewer than in 2016. That's because 110 Metro Transit employees were transferred to the Kalamazoo County Transit Authority.

Andy Robins has been WMUK's News Director since 1998 and a broadcast journalist for over 24 years. He joined WMUK's staff in 1985. Under his direction, WMUK has received numerous awards for news reporting.
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