Known as the Cereal City — thanks to the Kellogg Company, Post Foods and ConAgra Foods cereal industry presence here — Battle Creek sits near the wrist cuff of the Michigan mitten, off of Interstate 94 between Detroit and Chicago. Our approximately 52,000 residents live in the area of the Battle Creek and Kalamazoo Rivers and we are the Michigan city with the third-largest land area — nearly 44 square miles — with a rich mix of rural and urban experiences. We are a professionally-managed community, with a city manager and a nine-member city commission.
Our abundant history also includes the start of the Seventh-day Adventist church and a major role in the Underground Railroad. Sojourner Truth, the ex-slave known around the nation as an advocate for abolition and women’s rights, came to Battle Creek in 1856 and chose to make her home here for more than two decades.
We are bustling with large employers, also including DENSO Corp., the Hart-Dole-Inouye Federal Center, II Stanley, Duncan Aviation, the Michigan Air National Guard and more, and also are home to innovative entrepreneurs who have joined our downtown, a place growing in vibrancy since our Downtown Transformation Initiative began in 2008. We have myriad educational opportunities for people of all ages, with four public and a variety of private K-12 schools, the Battle Creek Area Math and Science Center for advanced students, Kellogg Community College, the Calhoun Area Technology Center, Kellogg Community College Regional Manufacturing Technology Center, and Western Michigan University School of Aviation Sciences with training at our W.K. Kellogg Airport.
We are proud to, again, make Site Selection Magazine’s top-10 list of metropolitan areas, based on economic development projects, for populations less than 200,000. We tied for eighth in 2014.
Our city is rich with recreational opportunities, many of which are connected by our 26-mile Linear Park, a paved pathway perfect for runners, walkers and bicyclists. We offer dozens of community and neighborhood parks, with playgrounds, wooded trails and our city beach. On top of that, recreational opportunities abound with our Bailey Park, home to the Northwood League’s Battle Creek Bombers summer baseball team; our Binder Park Golf Course, home to The First Tee, a junior golf program that builds character and promotes healthy choices for our youth; and our Full Blast Recreation Center, which offers a water park and a variety of sports and fitness programs for all ages. Families also can enjoy our Binder Park Zoo, located on 433 acres of city-owned property, backed up to our golf course, and includes one of the largest giraffe herds in the country.
We are environmental leaders, with our Sustainable BC Committee considering ways to reduce our carbon footprint and support environmentally-friendly practices. We are pilot testing the PulverDryer process, to turn solid waste into a reusable energy source. If successful, Battle Creek will be the first local government in the nation to achieve this level of environmental stewardship. We recently were recognized as a bronze Bicycle Friendly Community by the League of American Bicyclists, which gave us the strongest marks for our bicycle network, work with the community to streamline bicycle culture, and promotion of safety and protection of bicyclists’ rights. In April, we look forward to adding two propane-fueled buses to our city Transit system. We purchased these using Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality grants, choosing propane because of the expected cost savings, reduction of our environmental footprint and that fact that, also with the help of grants, we will install a propane fueling station this summer.
We even are depicted in the new CBS TV show, “Battle Creek,” a police procedural with a lot of humor.
We are making great strides in our communications to and engagement with our residents. We have an active presence on our website, Facebook and Twitter, and have sought our residents’ thoughts and opinions on various city issues through surveys. Most recently, we’ve asked for input as part of our city manager search, five-year Consolidated Plan process and a citizen survey. We hold Community Conversations as part of these and other processes, eager to hear from our residents, business owners and others with a connection to our community. We also produce and tape a public access TV show called “Keeping You Informed,” which does just that, sharing information about our city services. This winter, we began publishing a citizen newsletter for the first time in years. We want our residents to know we’re open to sharing information with them and will do so in as many different ways as possible.
Our vision is that Battle Creek is an extraordinary community where people choose to live, work and play and we continue to work together, as a community, to make that happen.
Connect with us online at www.battlecreekmi.gov and www.battlecreek.org, as well as on Facebook and Twitter.