City Government's Role in the Community Development System

City Government's Role in the Community Development System

Neil Mayer Principal, Neil Mayer & Associates Langley Keyes Massachusetts Institute of Technology

The Urban Institute

City Government's Role in the Community Development System

June 2005 Copyright ? 2005

Neil Mayer Principal, Neil Mayer & Associates Langley Keyes Massachusetts Institute of Technology

The Urban Institute Metropolitan Housing and Communities Policy Center 2100 M Street, NW Washington, DC 20037

The nonpartisan Urban Institute publishes studies, reports, and books on timely topics worthy of public consideration. The views expressed are those of the authors and should not be attributed to Living Cities or the Urban Institute, or to their trustees or funders.

ii City Government's Role in the Community Development System

Acknowledgments

The authors of this report thank Living Cities: The National Community Development Initiative for their financial support for this research, and acknowledge the helpful comments of Reese Fayde of Living Cities. The authors also thank the city officials, CDC directors, and others in the three best-practice cities for their contributions of time and expertise to this research. Cover photographs are from U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development except for bottom, which is U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census.

Table of Contents iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction and Summary of Findings

1

Analytical Framework for This Paper

2

Methodology

2

Findings

3

Road Map for This Paper

4

Section 1: How City Governments Support the Functions of Community Development 6

Active Response to Market Conditions

6

Provision of Operating Support

8

Provision of Gap Financing

10

Control over Land and Structures

12

Processing Project Fund Allocations and Development Permits

12

Section 2: Institutional Relationships in the Community Development System

15

City Government and Residential Neighborhoods

15

Forging a Special Relationship between City Government and CDCs

18

City Government and the Affordable Housing Lobby

19

City Government and Organizational Learning

19

Section 3: Recommendations

25

Endnotes

28

iv City Government's Role in the Community Development System

Appendix: Methodology

30

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