As a lifelong policy advocate, I don’t often get the chills. But this week in Kansas City, I did.
I was lucky enough to attend the second stop in the White House Office of Urban Affairs Listening Tour, which brought Obama Administration officials to help kick off the Kansas City Green Impact Zone, a “comprehensive, place-based plan to invest public and private funding to transform a neighborhood plagued by high rates of poverty and violence, unemployment, and abandoned property.” (Read more about the Zone here.)
It was moving to see top federal officials — like HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan; Transportation Deputy Secretary John Porcari; White House Urban Affairs Director Adolfo Carrion; and Special Advisor for Green Jobs Van Jones — on hand to really listen to the ideas and innovations of local leaders. There is a change afoot in how the federal government thinks of cities and metropolitan areas.
But, perhaps most important, it could be a model for how the federal government and local innovators can work together to make sure all Americans can live in communities of opportunity.
I don’t think these chills will be going away any time soon.
The Obama administration will announce plans today to virtually give away roughly 1,800 mobile homes to 3,400 families displaced by Hurricane Katrina who are living in government-provided housing along the Gulf Coast, officials said.
The administration also will make available $50 million in rental vouchers to income-eligible trailer occupants who move to targeted housing projects, and take over from Louisiana the job of helping residents find permanent homes, said a senior White House official, speaking on the condition of anonymity before the formal announcement.
The effort to bring more grocery stores to low-income areas–so-called “food deserts”–would receive a shot in the arm from legislation passed this week by the Illinois General Assembly.
The $3.1 billion public spending bill passed Monday includes $10 million for the Illinois Fresh Food Fund, money that would go to urban and rural neighborhoods with reduced access to healthier foods because they’re underserved by supermarkets.
HOUSTON — President Barack Obama wants to make a million houses a year more energy efficient as part of his goal to create thousands of “green” jobs and reduce U.S. carbon emissions.
But the administration’s push to expand an obscure antipoverty program into a centerpiece of that initiative is stirring debate over the best way to use a flash flood of federal stimulus dollars.
It’s a good snapshot of how recovery dollars are flowing, capturing the tension that many equity advocates are trying to navigate as they work to shape the implementation of recovery dollars in their communities — operating in the timeline required for spending the money but also pushing to invest wisely and equitably.
In most cases, though, the money is working its way into the system far more gradually as officials strive to meet not only existing guidelines for programs receiving aid but also reporting requirements that have been added to make sure that stimulus funding is spent as intended and to account for the jobs it creates.
As a result, White House officials say the bulk of the money will start hitting the streets later this year and early next, with the goal of spending 70 percent of it by the summer of 2010. As of Tuesday, $54 billion from the package had been “obligated,” meaning that states, cities or other recipients could begin drawing from it, and $11.7 billion of that had been disbursed.
While some are saying “recovery dollars are spent, we really can’t impact the process,” this article highlights the fact that many, many decisions remain to be made. Those of us working to expand opportunity for low-income people and communities of color, must continue to engage
The numbers aren’t so dismal here as pre-Katrina residents continue to return, creating a constant demand for construction. Nearly $35 billion in federal aid doesn’t hurt either.
Reporting from New Orleans — This city is a rarity in 2009: a place full of hard hats and big building projects and subcontractors roaring around in pickup trucks. A city where home prices have dipped only slightly, and where the unemployment rate is 5.3% — compared with 8.1% nationwide.
New Orleans, it seems, has largely dodged the Category 5 recession pummeling the rest of the country, thanks to its unique post-Katrina economy. For locals accustomed to bad luck and trouble, the good news can feel a little strange.
THE country has fallen on hard times, but those of us who love cities know we have been living in the dark ages for a while now. We know that turning things around will take more than just pouring money into shovel-ready projects, regardless of how they might boost the economy. Windmills won’t do it either. We long for a bold urban vision.
With their crowded neighborhoods and web of public services, cities are not only invaluable cultural incubators; they are also vastly more efficient than suburbs. But for years they have been neglected, and in many cases forcibly harmed, by policies that favored sprawl over density and conformity over difference.
“Congress Approves Budget,” - The Washington Post $3.5 Trillion Spending Plan Paves Way for Obama Goals
Congressional Democrats overwhelmingly embraced President Obama’s ambitious and expensive agenda for the nation yesterday, endorsing a $3.5 trillion spending plan that sets the stage for the president to pursue his most far-reaching priorities.
Voting along party lines, the House and Senate approved budget blueprints that would trim Obama’s spending proposals for the fiscal year that begins in October and curtail his plans to cut taxes. The blueprints, however, would permit work to begin on the central goals of Obama’s presidency: an expansion of health-care coverage for the uninsured, more money for college loans and a cap-and-trade system to reduce gases that contribute to global warming.
Van Jones, the founder of Green for All and author of the NYT best-seller Green Collar Economy, was just named “a special adviser for green jobs, enterprise and innovation in the Obama administration.”
Van is one of the most prominent leaders in the movement for equity in America. Just last week, PolicyLink CEO Angela Glover Blackwell and Associate Director Radhika Fox joined Van and his staff at Green for All for a packed conference call looking at the role of green jobs in the stimulus package.
More than 1,000 people attended the call. If you haven’t yet had a chance to listen, click the icon below. It’s a rich and informative call.
And while you’re at it, click this icon to read our new report with Green for All, entitled “Bringing Home the Green Recovery: A User’s Guide to the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.”
Also, if you want to congratulate Van and his team on pushing green job equity all the way to the White House, please hop on over to their excellent blog. It’s a good day for anyone who cares about equity and, in Van’s words, “greening the ghetto.”
The $787 billion recovery package marks a big, bold and historic investment in creating green jobs and building more equitable communities. The package invests nearly $100 billion in funding for transportation and infrastructure, $48 billion in investments in job training and education, $41 billion for energy-related programs, and $20 billion in tax incentives for renewable energy.
The in-depth guide offers tangible, up-to-date information and ideas for using and securing recovery dollars to help expand opportunity in low-income communities and communities of color.
The guide is a first step in what will be a vital nationwide effort to ensure the recovery package helps all communities rise stronger than ever from this economic crisis, and that community based organizations are at the forefront in crafting a green, equitable recovery.
I must say I felt hopeful when I came across a recent article in The Nation, introducing some of the interesting work that environmental advocate Kim Thompson-Gaddy, along with other city and state officials are bringing to the table.
I have no doubt that the residents of Newark, particularly the children—many whom suffer disproportionally from asthma—are ready for a cleaner Newark, with more green space, and the promise of green jobs which could help revive the local economy.
Newark Mayor Cory Booker, said it best, when stating that “Newark’s success in bringing its green vision to life will be measured largely by whether it can provide a pathway out of poverty.”
And though Newark still has a long way to go before this vision is realized—at least they are making progress…
Newark Mayor Cory Booker will soon announce that Thompson-Gaddy will chair a new environmental commission to make Newark a model green city;
Trenton Mayor Douglas Palmer convened his own green steering committee and used his position as president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors to place global warming atop the urban agenda;
The City of Newark, the Garden State Alliance for a New Economy, and the Laborers International Union’s eastern region organizing fund have launched a 6-week Green Jobs Construction Training Initiative;
Newark and the Greater Newark Conservancy are working on a prisoner re-entry program that will creat 128 jobs in its first year;
And the Apollo Alliance recently led Newark’s Green Future Summit where they estimated that 57, 228 jobs can be created in NJ by giving the state $3.2 billion of a proposed national Green Economic Recovery program
“Creating jobs—green or otherwise—in cities like Newark and Trenton is largely a question of resources, says Alan Berube, research director of the Metropolitan Policy Program at the Brookings Institution…the greatest potential for new resources to devote to such projects lies in the stimulus package being hammered out in Washington.”
place-based plan to invest public and private funding to transform a neighborhood plagued by high rates of poverty and violence, unemployment, and abandoned property.” (Read more about the Zone here.)
