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Policy
The rules of the game—and the attitudes of the players—have an enormous effect on community development work at all levels. Here we look at some of the conversations about how to shift that policy for the better.
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Advocates Say Money Motivates Think Tank’s Push to Criminalize Homelessness
A new report questions a billionaire-founded think tank's ties to law enforcement and surveillance—and its connections to the Trump administration.
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Urban Policy Next
Urban policies are the rules and incentives that shape the prosperity, equity, and environmental sustainability of the metropolitan regions in which 8 in 10 people live.
Time to Address the Rural Housing Crisis
The next administration will face significant housing issues well beyond those related to foreclosures and mortgage markets. The housing needs of low-income people in both urban and rural places predated […]
Breaking Asset Poverty: Better Homeownership—and More
Rather than abandoning homeownership as an asset-building strategy the next administration must pursue alternative strategies: bringing back “good homeownership,” supporting quality affordable rental housing, and developing other ways to help families of modest means invest for themselves and their future.
Needed: National Leadership for Sustainable Development
Imagine a country of walkable neighborhoods, transportation choices, healthy homes, less time in traffic, and more disposable income, complemented by a beautiful landscape of conservation lands and working forests and farms. That is still within our reach with vision and leadership.
The Other Health Agenda
What the next president can do to improve the health of low- and moderate-income Americans and to reduce glaring inequities in health care.
Poverty Measurements Fall Short
After more than four decades using a formula considered by critics as substandard and outdated, the House Ways and Means Committee’s Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support has begun […]
Early Childhood Education: A Teachable Moment
One of the greatest contributions that the new president could make to education would be to put the federal government squarely behind initiatives recognizing that improvements in schools depend on more children getting off to a good start.
Service Forum: McCain’s Moment of Truthiness
Just finished watching ServiceNation’s presidential forum on national service, and I’m here to give credit where it’s due: Judy Woodruff asked John McCain to explain his running-mate’s disparaging taunts about […]
Obama-Biden: What Does It Mean?
The text message hadn’t yet arrived: the media, once again, by way of stakeout, pestered its way to this scoop. After 1 a.m. Saturday morning, and after leaks throughout Friday […]
As Housing Program Moves Poor to the Suburbs, Do Tensions Follow?
Friday’s New York Times article on Section 8 households in Antioch, Calif., has attracted a great deal of attention. I couldn’t wait to read it because I recently published a […]
You Don’t Have to Go Home — You Just Can’t Stay Here
The wags at Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) — a.k.a the U.S. immigration agency — launched a pilot program last week that would allow people with outstanding deportation orders to […]
Where Do Houses Go When They Die? (Apparently, Pennsylvania)
The late George Carlin once quipped that “Frisbeetarianism is the belief that when you die, your soul goes up on the roof and gets stuck.” When homeowners die, or are […]