Editor’s note: Kresge Foundation is one of BridgeDetroit’s philanthropic sponsors. See the full list of funders here. 

The Kresge Foundation is planning a $180 million investment in northwest Detroit, including a move to a new headquarters at the Marygrove Conservancy Campus and revitalizing surrounding neighborhoods and business corridors. 

With a large influx of investment and a new development on Marygrove’s campus, Kresge acknowledges that there is risk of raising property taxes on surrounding homes, which could lead to pricing out existing residents and renters. But, it’s something that the foundation has plans to tackle, Wendy Lewis Jackson, the foundation’s managing director of Detroit-focused programs, stressed Thursday.

“One of the things we will look at is property tax relief. How can we ensure that some of the investment that we’ll be making helps particularly seniors and families with young children that are experiencing a property tax burden, how do we work to erase that tax burden,” she said. “The other program we would look to explore is support for renters.”

The move also means Kresge will eventually sell its newly renovated three-acre campus on Big Beaver Road in Troy and not renew its lease on a 2,500-square-foot Midtown Detroit office in the Woodward Gardens Block building. The construction of a new headquarters will require the foundation to issue a $130 million bond in January, while the rest of the $50 million for the project will come as grants. 

A formal public announcement at Marygrove will take place Friday morning; Mayor Mike Duggan, Marygrove Conservancy CEO Tom Lewand, Detroit Public Schools Community District Superintendent Dr. Nikolai Vitti and Liv6 Alliance Director Caitlin Murphy, among others, are scheduled to speak. 

“Why would we be located in a city where we wouldn’t invest?,” CEO and President Rip Rapson told the media Thursday at an announcement preview in Detroit. “In the last number of years it’s become clear so much of our ability to have credibility in a city comes from being part of a city.”

The Kresge Foundation was established in Detroit in 1924 by Sebastian Spering Kresge, whose retail empire, the S.S. Kresge Co., brought low-priced goods to the masses through five and dime stores and later, Kmart. It has a $4 billion endowment. The foundation moved to its Troy headquarters in 1970. It currently has 130 employees. 

Keeping commitments 

Lewis Jackson said the new funding from Kresge is the third step in an ongoing process where the foundation made commitments to northwest Detroit residents and nonprofit organizations. 

The first step was revitalizing the Avenue of Fashion at Six Mile and Livernois. Kresge contributed $200,000 in 2014 to beautification of the Livernois Avenue median and committed another $400,000 to the creation of the Live6 Alliance, a community development corporation to coordinate revitalization strategies in the surrounding area.

The next step was providing more than $50 million to transform Marygrove into a cradle-to-career campus that provides everything from early childhood education, high school and college classes while also providing services to the greater community. Rapson said 900 children are now attending classes at the various Marygrove programs. 

This third stage is bringing in an additional $50 million to focus on strengthening the surrounding communities around Marygrove without causing gentrification and pushing out existing residents. Kresge is calling this effort, alongside the Liv6 Alliance, the Resident Investment and Opportunity Fund. It will focus on:

• Vacant land stewardship, beautification and side lot activation
• Home maintenance, repairs and accessibility improvements
• Property tax relief
• Support for renters
• Finishing the Ella Fitzgerald Greenway and enhancing Ella Fitzgerald Park
• Small business support on McNichols and Wyoming with the goal of creating an arts and early education corridor

The neighborhoods targeted by the Resident Investment and Opportunity Fund include Fitzgerald, Bagley, Martin Park and University District. 

“We’re still working with residents participating in the action planning process to determine more specifics… most if not three-quarters of that will be used particularly for home repair,” Lewis Jackson said. “We’re looking at how we can you do home repair more transformationally in a community, which will have implications throughout the city.”

Lewis Jackson said residents can expect to see the greenway finished around January and the first public outreach to existing entrepreneurs on the McNichols and Wyoming corridors by next month. 

Rapson said the foundation has already quietly begun working with the Detroit Land Bank Authority and the City of Detroit to purchase and transfer control of vacant properties along the Wyoming Corridor to local groups. But he acknowledged the foundation “can only go so far” in building change and it will require collaboration from city departments and the public sector. 

“I don’t want to underestimate how hard it’s going to be to do housing stabilization, tax foreclosure stabilization, property tax increases. We’re going to look at all that stuff. Nothing is off the table,” Rapson said. “We will move money. We will make this investment – guaranteed. Whether it will produce all of the results that we hope, that’s harder to know, but we will absolutely pursue it in good faith and spend every dollar committed and more.”

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to correct the bond amount Kresge will issue to fund its new headquarters.