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16,000 employees offered cash incentives to move to Detroit

Detroit City Skyline
user Bernt Rostad
/
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Five Detroit businesses hope to entice their employees to move downtown by offering them cash incentives.

Several Detroit businesses are paying their employees to move to the city as part of a new incentive program called "Live Downtown."

Employees can get $20,000 dollars toward the purchase of a new home. Those who rent will get up to $3,500 for two years. Even employees who already live in the city can get money to make home improvements.

Here's a list of the 5 companies behind the new "Live Downtown" program:

  • Compuware
  • DTE Energy
  • Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan
  • Quicken Loans
  • Strategic Staffing Solutions

Denise Starr is with Compuware. She says between the five companies, there are "about 16,000employees, so if you’re able to even get 5% of that, that’s a significant number" of houses sold, rented or renovated.

“Live Downtown” is modeled after a similar program called "Live Midtown," which launched earlier this year for employees at Wayne State, Detroit Medical Center, and Henry Ford Health System.

Jennifer is a reporter for Michigan Radio's State of Opportunity project, which looks at kids from low-income families and what it takes to get them ahead. She previously covered arts and culture for the station, and was one of the lead reporters on the award-winning education series Rebuilding Detroit Schools. Prior to working at Michigan Radio, Jennifer lived in New York where she was a producer at WFUV, an NPR station in the Bronx.
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