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National
DOT-HUD Task Force to Focus on Livable Communities Initiative
As the White House plots a long-term sustainability and resource-management course, with a ''livable communities'' initiative among top presidential priorities in the 2010 FY budget, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan will work through a joint task force to involve the public in planning, expand transportation alternatives and transit-oriented development, and provide less costly housing near jobs, while coordinated federal investments in livability will encourage urban regions to create and follow integrated housing, land-use and transportation plans.
''Livability incorporates the concept of collaborative decision-making,'' said Secretary LaHood in testimony before the House Transportation, Housing and Urban Development Appropriations Subcommittee, noting that the new congressional transportation funding act also opens up an opportunity to recast the federal transportation policy and address housing and land-use concerns.
Secretary Donovan, observes E & E Daily reporter Josh Voorhees, said the combined DOT-HUD task force will work out federal housing-affordability measures that will include transportation, energy and other costs, to inform consumers and enable the market to price housing accordingly.
He called the costs of housing and transportation intrinsically linked, but the former often underestimated, since many suburban homeowners and renters, who fail to factor in the time and money spent on commuting or running errands, have really traded ''relatively high housing costs for high transportation costs in their search for affordable housing.''
Subcommittee Democratic Chairman John Olver and Republican ranking member Tom Latham applauded the DOT-HUD partnership, though the latter expressed doubt if the ''livable community'' initiative's focus on transit can help widely spread rural and suburban areas.
In response, Secretary Donovan pointed out that sustainability is a flexible rather than a one-size-fits-all concept, which can be tailored to make both urban and rural lives better.
''What we are talking about here,'' he stressed, ''is not a zero-sum game.'' -- Energy & Environment Daily 3/19/2009
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