City Executive Board ratified Vantaa’s 2023 budget: Additional investments in educational support measures, accessibility of personnel, and school meals

The City of Vantaa will next year have numerous important investment projects, the majority of which are targeted at new building and repair. Five new daycare centers will be completed in 2023, and planning of Vantaa light rail and Elmo swimming hall will continue. Vantaa Vocational College Varia’s investment project in Vehkala will progress, and a learning campus is being planned for Tikkurila, in addition to the big Jokiniemi project. Developing Kuusijärvi Recreation Center Vantaa into a major nature site will also continue. After a lengthy wait, Kivistö shopping and service center will be completed, and the city will transfer some of its services into the center. In addition, the city is opening more than 220 vacancies to improve its services. The city's real-estate taxes will remain unchanged in 2023. 

The most important appropriation changes the city executive board made are allocating €1 million for the city employees’ well-being at work, as well as addressing the problem of acquiring employees and maintaining them and allocating an additional €1 million for schools’ and pre-primary education support measures. Furthermore, Vantaa will spend €400,000 on developing school meals. A sum of €100,000 will be spent on bolstering outreach youth work, whereas €90,000 is allocated for developing services for the long-term unemployed youth. 

The city’s fiscal consolidation over the past few years has generated good results, and Vantaa’s economy now rests on solid ground. Vantaa has reduced its debt by €250 million and is currently one of the least indebted cities among Finland’s large cities. The wellbeing services county reform will change the city’s operations and economy, and the city's operating environment has already drastically changed after Russia attacked Ukraine. Vantaa will continue to balance its economy and, at the same time, make major investments in the city's growth.

Regional Program of Positive Action to be continued

The city executive board also approved Vantaa’s new Regional Program of Positive Action in its meeting. The goal of the program is to bridge the gaps between the residents’ and the city’s different regions’ wellbeing differences. Altogether €6 million—€2 million per year—is budgeted for implementing the program during 2023 - 2025. The program aims to improve childcare and upbringing assistance, to develop youth work, to reduce educational inequality, to conduct socially sustainable housing and land-use policy, as well as to boost residents’ sense of community.

Homes for 1,300 residents in Kivistö and a new fire station in Myyrmäki

The city executive board decided to submit for the city council’s approval the updated local detailed plan for Kivistö's Lumikvartsi as well as the alteration to local detailed plan for Raappavuorentie in Myyrmäki. 
The local detailed plan for Kivistö's Lumikvartsi expands downtown Kivistö toward the Ring Rail Line's southern—still unbuilt—area where two daycare centers, a dog park, services, and homes for around 1,300 residents will be built.
A new fire station will be built in Kivikaudenpuisto, along Myyrmäki’s Raappavuorentie. The fire station will house a top unit, an ambulance, and two volunteer fire department units. The aim is to build a new rescue station, amounting to around 850 k-m2, that can be expanded into a 1,200-k-m2 fire station as the city grows.