Reflecting upon President Trump’s State of the Union address last night, Smart Growth America President and CEO Geoff Anderson offered this statement on behalf of all SGA programs:
“The president’s pitch for an infrastructure plan to catalyze $1.5 trillion in new investment is ambitious, but with so few details, it still just leads to more questions—questions that so far have unsatisfying answers: Where will any new revenue come from? Will the plan be funded by gutting existing transportation programs that cities and towns depend on? Will there be a real commitment to repairing our aging infrastructure first before building new expensive liabilities? The dollar figure is less important than how we choose to invest those dollars.
“The infrastructure plan continues to be a vague promise on the horizon, but the administration’s budget proposal is coming up in the next two weeks and it represents an immediate opportunity to invest in infrastructure and communities. The president’s last budget proposed draconian cuts in funding for infrastructure, affordable housing and other programs that would have devastated communities large and small. We hope that the upcoming budget reverses course and moves in the direction of the president’s rhetoric from last night—investing in America’s towns, cities and neighborhoods. It does little good to pour new money into new infrastructure while taking away the critical housing, economic development, transit and other funding sources for communities that currently sustain economic development efforts at the local level.
“We’re eager to work with the administration and with Congress to shape an infrastructure plan that could bring real prosperity to communities of all sizes, but we need more than just sweeping rhetoric. It must be matched by action. With the president’s budget proposal, we’ll see if it is.”