Wow! New York City Housing Preservation and Development Commissioner, Shaun Donovan has been pegged to head up HUD (I don’t know about other folks, but he was always on my list.)?! I tell ya’, I almost did a dance this morning. No, not because I am Mr. Donovan’s number one fan (because I am not-I am still a little pissed off about the implementation of the inclusionary zoning provision-which is not inclusionary at all.), but because it’s about time someone with some significant housing experience, respect within the community development community, and some proven ability to manage large scale housing initiatives was appointed to run what is probably the most beleaguered agency in the Fed (i.e., the poster child for the red-headed step-kid).
The history of HUD over the past 27 years has been checkered, to put it much too kindly. And it seems the Obama transition team recognizes that HUD cannot be a second-tier partner, if revitalizing our urban infrastructure and stemming the foreclosure tide is an integral part in turning around the economic outlook of the country-and of his domestic agenda.
It is quite refreshing to see an incoming administration that believes HUD can and should be fixed-not left to die like a rotting corpse or driven into the ground by cronyism. Unlike the past 3 administrations (okay, two, the Clinton’s gave it the old college try with Cisneros and Cuomo), the transition team has gone 180 degrees away from crooks like Jackson, housing know-nothings Martinez, or conniving “Uncle” crooks like Mr. Pierce and his former cocktail waitressing henchlady, Deborah Gore Dean.
As a matter of fact, the last promising HUD secretary, was not even appointed during a Democratic administration as you might suspect, it was G.W.H. Bush, who unwittingly gave HUD a fighting chance. And guess what? When it became apparent that he might actually want to do “something” to fix the scandal-ridden department, the administration practically ran poor Mr. Kemp out of town with a shotgun for bothering. (And when I say do something, I am mostly referring to the fact that he was not trying to dismantle it.)
I guess, G.W, was sent up for clean-up bat on that one with Martinez and then Mr. Jackson?
These consistently uninterested and largely unqualified leaders have left behind a badly beaten agency, with abysmal working conditions (have you ever seen the HUD building in DC-Gawd save them all!!), and terrible morale. 
It is an agency that has stumbled badly and for lack of a good plan has become purely reactionary. You might as well take the Urban out of HUD, as urban policy issues as the urban core has not been of interest in decades. Summarily, the agency has a cacophony of programs that don’t work well together (with mere band-aid solutions to try to fix them), and has been so loathed on the hill that it has next to no influence on the low-income housing tax credit (key word: Housing), arguably the largest funding source for rental housing development for low and moderate income folks. As a matter of fact, the program is housed in the Treasury (whether this a good idea or not-don’t know).
In a nutshell, HUD desperately needs a successful housing manager who can wrap his arms around the whole mess (and of course it helps that he was also briefly an assistant secretary in the agency during the Clinton years.) and just possibly take a big enough bite out of the nut to make some traction. It seems Mr. Donovan might just have the gall to do it. After all, taking 30,000 vacant units and turning them into viable housing was no picnic-and definitely no easy feat. As a matter of fact, he might have a better chance at turning HUD into a viable, productive agency than most.
Provided Mr. Donovan recognizes NYC is the exception not the rule, life for housing folk might get rosier. But in the end, from where HUD sits in the heart and minds of many today, things can only look up!
