A recent article in the New York Times explored the means for overcoming the potential for future flood devastation like that caused by Hurricane Sandy. The article profiled Henk Ovink, a leader on water management in the Netherlands currently serving as senior advisor to HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan. Ovink advocates for broad-based, regional approaches to implementing systemic change to protect communities from the devastation brought about too much water, an issue of increasing concern for low-lying coastal communities.
Ovink has been spreading the word and advocating for an approach that takes a communal, rather than individualistic or isolated, approach to the problem. It was one he shared with the American Bar Association Forum on Affordable Housing & Community Development Law at its annual conference in May 2013. As the article points out, one of Ovink’s mantras is, “We need to use the future as a reference, not the past.”
I was struck last May and then again a few days ago when reading the Times article by how much Ovink’s message applies not only to flooding preparedness and rebuilding communities after disaster, but to community revitalization and the provision of affordable housing. Ovink advocates an approach to the complex problem of climate change and rising sea levels with an interdisciplinary model that does not limit who participates in identifying strategies in an effort to find solutions that can be replicated and applied broadly. An approach that could make other HUD initiatives like Choice Neighborhoods and the Rental Assistance Demonstration transformative.
With Choice Neighborhoods focused on the three core goals of housing, people and neighborhoods and Choice Neighborhood grantees undertaking efforts that reach beyond assisted housing to reinvigorate housing, public health, safety, child care, transportation and social services, it steps outside the platform established with HOPE VI. To be truly transformative, however, it will take investment from the entire community, not just the housing sector. On the RAD front, it will have to be more than just shifting the subsidy stream from public housing to Section 8. Rather, RAD can serve a broader purpose if the tools made available by unlocking the subsidy leverage other investment creatively to maximize dynamic community renewal. Along the way, we should remember to “use the future as a reference”.