Posted on 06/09/2010 12:18:50 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
WASHINGTON (Reuters) The Senate moved closer on Wednesday to making the concept of "livable communities" a part of national law that would provide federal grants to help local governments implement comprehensive city planning.
Almost a year after Sen. Chris Dodd, the Banking Committee chairman from Connecticut, introduced a bill, the committee held its first hearing. The bill proposes giving livability grants to metropolitan organizations and creating an interagency office on sustainable communities within the executive branch.
The grant amounts would depend on the size of the city and the use of the money. The bill would authorize $100 million in total each year through 2013 for planning grants and $3.75 billion through 2013 for implementation grants.
A similar bill was introduced in the House of Representatives in February.
Dodd described the bill as combining housing development, public transit, and infrastructure and land-use planning into one comprehensive approach to city development. Currently, many of those decisions are made separately from one another, and Dodd and others said the partitions have led to urban sprawl.
Livability advocates promote public transportation and bike paths and building energy efficient homes. The payoff of combining city planning will be great, according to Dodd.
"Our nation is facing a number of significant problems, including a struggling economy, an explosion in home foreclosures, the looming threat of climate change, an increasingly worrisome dependence on foreign oil, deteriorating infrastructure, and, yes, worsening traffic congestion," he said.
Other senators said the bill will reduce the rates of asthma in children, draw younger people back to abandoned downtown areas, reduce obesity by promoting walking and bicycling, and get workers to their jobs on time.
Critics say the bill is vague, extends the reach of the federal government too far into the dealings of local governments and costs too much.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
a reach too far..
or been there, done that ..
Good-Bye, Christopher. Say Good Night already!
wanna make cities more livable? cut taxes!
You know central planning is probably not a great idea. Anyone remember the Great Society? Look how well that turned out.
These clowns really need to just STOP THE MADNESS!
Your tax dollars swirling down the drain.
I wonder if they might consider adding a ‘beef up yur bunker’ incentive or tax write-off at least.
‘”Our nation is facing a number of significant problems, including a struggling economy, an explosion in home foreclosures, the looming threat of climate change, an increasingly worrisome dependence on foreign oil, deteriorating infrastructure, and, yes, worsening traffic congestion,” he said.’
All brought to you by the same ideological bunch pushing this legislation! The fix is always far worse than the cause.
A photo of the Democrat's ideal city environment...I'm about 20 minutes from here.
Dust off the blue-prints for Cabrini Green.
Dodd playing God.
The dumb fat slob doesn’t know we are broke.
Here are some "livable cities" the government has created in the past:
Not to mention the many wonders of government-run Section 8 housing.
That is precisely what they want to do.
Shove us all into high density cities, and eliminate rural America, no matter the cost.
That is the liberal nirvanna.
Heard all the sheeple into pens.
Central plan your land, your house, your health, your business, your money but other than that you live in a free country.
Then they should stay out of them.
That is not, by any chance, Newark, New Jersey, is it?
No, all of your planning has turned most city centers into @#$*holes which cause each generation to want to move further away. You say national urban planning and I start looking for some farmland to buy.
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