This post was originally published on the Huffington Post.

In its report yesterday, the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform encouraged Congress to cut from the federal budget “wasteful spending, including subsidies that are poorly targeted or create perverse incentives…” People who care about making great neighborhoods, take notice. Unbeknownst to most, the federal government plays a massive role in the real estate market by subsidizing and enabling all kinds of development in our communities. With ballooning deficits, now seems like a good time to revisit these subsidies and make sure they are achieving a legitimate public purpose -and not, in the commission’s words, “creating perverse incentives.”