Northern Michigan chambers of commerce are advocating lawmakers to give them more control over how development is incentivized in their communities.
The Northern Michigan Chamber Alliance represents nine chambers of commerce in the Northern Lower and Upper Peninsulas and released its policy goals on April 19th.
The policy agenda features four primary goals including attracting talent, increasing housing development, and ensuring access to child care.
Kent Wood is the director of Government Relations at the Chamber Alliance. He said currently local governments have to use state or federal programs to incentivize development.
“That’s what we would like to create is the ability for a city, a township, a county to be able to say we’ve got our own payment in lieu of taxes program.”
Wood said legislation is being drafted that would allow local governments to offer incentives to developers for things like affordable housing.
Wood said another major pillar of the new legislative agenda is making sure families have access to childcare.
“Childcare is an issue we’re hearing across the state but even more and more in rural areas we’re hearing about what we refer to as childcare desserts.”
Wood said childcare can also be a barrier to attracting talent and development in an area.