After five years of steady statewide improvement, fewer Michigan communities report they are better able to meet their fiscal needs this year.
A U-M survey polled top elected and appointed officials in the state’s 1,856 units of local government and found that 2016 marked a change in earlier trends with 31 percent better able to meet financial needs and 22 percent less able to do so.
That compares to 38 percent in 2015 saying they were better able to meet fiscal needs and 20 percent less able to do so.
“For the first time since the end of the Great Recession, the trend of more and more local officials reporting gradual improvements in fiscal health overall has reversed,” said Thomas Ivacko, administrator and program manager of the Ford School’s Center for Local, State and Urban Policy.
