Ann Arbor School District gets $1.4M grant for annexing Whitmore Lake schools

Ann Arbor Public School District will be provided with a grant of $1.4 million by the state government for the proposed annexation of Whitmore Lake schools, the Michigan Department of Education confirmed on Friday.

The grant will come from a fund of $4.3 million that has been created to help school districts take possession of some other schools to consolidate districts and services.

Ann Arbor Public School district is one of twelve districts to receive funds from the special pot. Calhoun Intermediate School District will receive the second-biggest grant of $945,454 for technology support staff, state data reporting and data warehousing system.

However, the initiative is yet to obtain approval from voters, who will be asked to approve or turn down the proposal in the November ballot.

Jeanice Swift, Superintendent of Ann Arbor Public School, said, "The grant application award is one of the critical pieces of information that we have been waiting to know and citizens will require in order to carefully evaluate the annexation opportunity that will be in front of our voters in November."

Ann Arbor Public School district had sought much more, $4.1 million, from the state for the annexation Whitmore Lake schools. However, Swift expressed hope that the grant issued by the state would be sufficient to accomplish the task.

Ann Arbor and Whitmore Lake voters will have to approve the annexation before it can proceed. The voting is scheduled to take place on November 4, 2014.