State Board approves millions more for downtown development projects, while nearly half of Grand Rapidians live paycheck to paycheck

On Tuesday, the Michigan Strategic Fund Board unanimously approved $252.3 million of incentives for the 12,000 seat Amphitheater in downtown Grand Rapids. This announcement marks just the latest in a series of announcements, where millions of dollars in public money will be used to support the designed of the private group known as Grand Action 2.0.

WOODTV8 reported on the announcement, but did what most commercial news media outlets do, they celebrate the announcement and only cited the Executive Director of Grand Action 2.0.  

Channel 8 didn’t even bother to inform people what the Michigan Strategic Fund Board does or that it was created by former Michigan Governor Rick Snyder in 2012, the same Governor who imposed a non-elected governing body in Flint, which led to the water crisis that has harmed thousands and impacted a whole generation of mostly poor and Black residents. Former Governor Snyder committed crimes, yet he continues to walk free.

The Michigan Strategic Fund Board is also made up of people from the corporate world, along with a few government staffers. Included among the MSF Board is Randy Thelen, the President and CEO of the Right Place Inc. Thelen has been a champion of the Amphitheater project from the beginning, along with the Soccer Stadium and any other downtown development project that use public funds.

You can read the memo from the Michigan Strategic Fund Board regarding the $252.3 million in public money for the Amphitheater, the Soccer Stadium and the adjacent over priced housing that will be built with both of these projects. 

One yearns for the day when the State of Michigan, the Kent County Commission or the Grand Rapids City Commission unanimously approves $252.3 million for families that are subjected to poverty condition, where they can’t afford decent housing, are food insecure and don’t have the kind of health care coverage that government officials do. In July, I wrote about the most recent data in Grand Rapids residents that are living in poverty which is based on the ALICE standards – Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed. According to the ALICE report 47% for Grand Rapids households, which is nearly half of the households in Grand Rapids, are living paycheck to paycheck!

Now, we can yearn for a day when government officials will chose people over projects hatched by the rich, but such a day will never come. If we want to support people over profits, then we will need to be organized in such a way as to force government officials to fund real community needs instead of projects that will primarily make the rich members of Grand Action 2.0 even richer. Now that is the kind of day that I yearn for!