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New Survey: New Jerseyans Support Statewide Planning and Water Quality Protection

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New Jerseyans’ decades-long support for coordinated statewide planning to guide growth and development and protect farmland and open space remains undiminished, according to a poll released today by smart growth, environmental and transportation advocates.

The poll, conducted by the Monmouth University Polling Institute, found that residents are as concerned about protecting drinking water as they are about the economy. Ninety one percent identify protecting the state’s drinking water supply as very important, compared to 88 percent who say that attracting new business is a top concern.

New Jerseyans are enthusiastic about sustainable communities – places where a variety of transportation options already exist and neighborhoods are within walking distance of shopping and other services. Two-thirds of residents believe the state needs more sustainable communities and nearly three in four say they would definitely (46 percent) or probably (27 percent) like to live in such a place.

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Model Design Manual helps towns of all sizes create Living Streets

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Earlier this year, over 60 experts – including Will Schroeer, Smart Growth America’s Director of Policy and Research, and Barbara McCann, Executive Director of the National Complete Streets Coalition – gathered in Los Angeles for a two-day collaborative charette. Funded by the Department of Health and Human Services through the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health and the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation, outcomes from the charette were released today as the Model Design Manual for Living Streets.

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Spotlight on Sustainability: Northern and Down East Maine

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The following is based on an interview with Ryan Pelletier, Director of Workforce Development, Northern Maine Development Commission

Faced with economic distress, outmigration, soaring unemployment, and numbers of low-income and underrepresented populations well over the national average, two counties in Northern and Down East Maine began searching for solutions. Aroostook and Washington counties, the two largest and poorest in Maine, recently joined together to form one Economic Development District. Combining eleven groups that represent the population of 104,175, the region was awarded a Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Regional Planning grant through the federal Partnership for Sustainable Communities.

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Discussing green infrastructure jobs and innovative water policies in Milwaukee, WI

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Water.

What’s the first thing you think of when you read that word? If you answered, “jobs,” you’re probably here at the Urban Water Sustainability Leadership Conference here in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins, CEO of Green for All, just released Water Works: Rebuilding infrastructure, creating jobs, greening the environment. “No group has the potential to hire more people,” Ms. Ellis-Lamkins told the audience of utility managers, engineers, planners and advocates. Energy efficiency may be the focus of green jobs in Washington, D.C., but green energy “has nothing on job numbers” compared to green water infrastructure. According to the new report, adequate investment in green water infrastructure over the next five years could generate $265.6 billion in economic activity and create close to 1.9 million jobs.

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Senator Menendez introduces S. 1621, the Livable Communities Act

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Last week, Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ), along with 17 cosponsors, introduced S. 1621, the Livable Communities Act. The Act promotes local leadership to develop innovative solutions that reflect the unique economic assets of communities that will maximize the returns of Federal funding of housing, transportation, and other infrastructure investments. The Livable Communities Act will spur private sector investment, cut red tape, and help federal agencies work more effectively, and create jobs at a time when America needs it most.

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Partnership for Sustainable Communities Web Briefing materials now available

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Thank you to everyone who attended SGA’s Sustainable Communities Network “Partnership for Sustainable Communities Web Briefing” earlier this week.

Smart Growth America hosted senior leadership from the U.S. Department of Transportation, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the White House Office of Public Affairs on the briefing and provided an opportunity to ask questions and receive updates on this year’s Partnership for Sustainable Communities grants, where the Partnership stands in the fiscal year 2012 budget, and upcoming announcements and opportunities. We also heard about the American Jobs Act and a joint report to Congress from DOT and HUD on barriers to coordinated transportation and housing investments.

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Shifting demand spurs new development in downtown Las Vegas

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Real estate developers in Las Vegas are seeing growing demand for homes downtown.

An article in the Las Vegas Sun this week chronicles the change, explaining that offers for homes in the heart of the city are coming in above asking price, and as new amenities are created in the city developers expect demand to rise even higher.

“That’s what you need for a city to grow is rental housing,” said New York developer Barnet Liberman, as quoted by the Sun. “There shouldn’t be any barrier for lower-income people to be able to grow and prosper. The only question for developers, guys like myself, is they’ve got to know that there’s a real solid, almost certainty that if they do A, B and C, then they get D. When you see that the city is behind you in terms of a common goal, it helps eliminate some of the risk.”

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