KALAMAZOO (WKZO-AM) — The Memorandum of understanding that lays out the basic agreement between the city of Kalamazoo and the donors who have offered to give the city $70 million to fix the city’s budget crisis is now available for public review.
You can view the document here.
City Manager Jim Ritsema said that initial grant will allow the city to lower property taxes for the next three years, erase their annual deficits and leave funding for aspirational programs to fight poverty and make Kalamazoo a more attractive community.
“It’s really going to lay out what will be happening over the next three years and long-term with the creation of the foundation,” Ritsema said.
The city will be able to use that three years of stable budgets to develop a trust fund that will become the Foundation for Excellence, and will continue to cover the gap between what state and local revenue brings in, and what it costs to make Kalamazoo solvent and prosperous.
One estimate is that it will take around $500 million to create a fund large enough to be sustainable.
The Memorandum will be the sole subject of a special town forum next Monday night at Anna Whitten Hall on Kalamazoo Valley Community College’s downtown campus.
