Feds pursue NU agenda with more funds and holistic policies

HUD will use “location efficiency” as a criterion for awarding billions of dollars in government grants.

Secretary Shaun Donovan electrified the Congress for New Urbanism’s annual gathering in May by announcing that the US Department of Housing & Urban Development will use location efficiency to score grant applications and will use the LEED-ND rating system to bring more walkable, mixed use neighborhoods into existence.

“It’s time that federal dollars stopped encouraging sprawl and started lowering the barriers to the kind of sustainable development our country needs,” Donovan told an enthusiastic crowd that assembled in Atlanta for CNU’s 18th congress. Even coming from an Obama administration known to look favorably on compact development, Donovan’s speech struck new urbanists as a breakthrough. The congress attracted 1,400 people from North America and abroad.

The secretary, who previously led New York City’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development, criticized the “drive to qualify” mode of thinking, which for decades encouraged families to move to new, lower-density locations far from city centers. “We’ve learned from foreclosure patterns that hidden costs like transportation can put families over the edge into increased financial vulnerability,” he said.

Donovan outlined the following ways in which the Obama administration will help

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