KALMAZOO TOWNSHIP (WKZO) — Kalamazoo Township residents will be going to the polls Tuesday to decide a 9.75-million dollar bond issue to fix their local streets.
Township Trustees decided this would be the wisest way to go about upgrading the Township’s roads. They can include multiple streets on the same contracts, saving money, get all the roads done in the next three years and have enough coming in to maintain them.
They say prices will only go up in the years to come.
If they have to do it piecemeal, they say it will cost more and the job will never get done.
Township Treasurer George Cochran has been a long time advocate of getting the roads improved. He says it will make for a happier and healthier community, economically.
Former Trustee Kathleen Dornbos says this is being rushed through without enough public input. She has organized a campaign to defeat it.
Trustees say they wouldn’t have gone this route if a poll of township voters had not shown they would support a tax hike to fix the roads.
The state vote in May if passed would address state trunk lines in the Township but not local roads.
It is the only item on a ballot in Kalamazoo County Tuesday.
