This fall, we invite you to join Smart Growth America, LOCUS: Responsible Real Estate Developers and Investors, and over a dozen smart growth experts from across the country for Commonwealth Communities: Smart Growth Strategies for our Emergent Future. COVID-19 has dramatically altered our communities and our sense of place. Before Massachusetts began to reopen, we spent months hunkered … Continued
After five years as the director of the National Complete Streets Coalition, Emiko Atherton is departing Smart Growth America in July after making an indelible impact on the national, state, and local push for implementing safer streets that everyone can enjoy.
To everyone who is feeling anger, sadness, frustration and grief right now: we see you and we hear you. We join you in grieving the recent senseless deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery and other black Americans…
Form-based codes are municipal zoning codes that shape development by defining characteristics of building form, streets, and open space as opposed to relying on use as an organizing principle.
Resilience-based land use planning can help communities weather hazards like the wildfires that struck Bastrop, TX in 2011. Photo by Joe Wolf, via Flickr.
State governments play a key role in addressing the immediate aftermath of disasters. But what can they do to reduce risks before disasters happen—and how can they guide rebuilding to reduce future risks? State leaders sit at the intersection of policy and investment decisions that can ensure long-term state resilience and economic growth.
Smart Growth America’s new State Resilience Program, launching today, is a first-of-its-kind initiative offering resources, tools, and guidance for state leaders working to build more resilient places and reduce the risk that natural hazards pose to vulnerable populations and local economies. Drawing on the innovative work of state leaders, federal agencies, and national experts, the State Resilience Program offers resources and guidance representing the cutting edge of land use and engagement strategies for hazard resilience.
LOCUS President Chris Leinberger introduces Place-Based Model for Social Equity
This week, LOCUS: Responsible Real Estate Developers and Investors, a program of Smart Growth America, announced a three-part national strategy to address housing and social equity calling upon developers to join them in the cause. The proposed initiative would be centered around new conscious place-based social equity metrics.
The announcement came Tuesday during the third annual Walkable Urban Places Conference, co-hosted by Urban Land Institute Washington and the George Washington University Center for Real Estate and Urban Analysis. LOCUS sponsored the event along with Venable LLP.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announces $4,000,000 in funding for brownfields. The Brownfields Area-Wide Planning Grant program facilitates community involvement as well as the research, training, and technical assistance necessary for brownfields assessment, cleanup, and subsequent reuse.
Brownfields area-wide planning grant funding must be directed to specific areas affected by either a single large site or multiple brownfield sites, such as a neighborhood, downtown district, city block, or local commercial corridor. The grant funding will result in an area-wide plan, including implementation strategies, for the brownfields-affected area. The brownfields area-wide plan will inform the assessment, cleanup, and reuse of brownfield properties and promote area-wide revitalization.
The Environmental Protection Agency recently announced the 2012 recipients of the Smart Growth Implementation Assistance (SGIA) program. SGIA will provide technical assistance to five communities nationwide that request the EPA’s help in finding the best strategies for sustainable growth. As part of the Partnership for Sustainable Communities, the EPA will be working along with the Department of Transportation (DOT) and the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). The 2012 recipients are: the state of Vermont; Madison County, NY; San Francisco, CA; Spokane Tribe of Indians, WA; and Billings, MT.
The Environmental Protection Agency is currently accepting applications for its annual National Award for Smart Growth Achievement, due April 6th, 2012.
The award recognizes communities nationwide that have developed successful strategies for promoting and implementing sustainable practices in the economy, housing, transportation, and the environment.