Revisiting the Stimulus & Sprawl

by Leigh Graham

Published March 30, 2009 @ 06:28AM PT

A month or so ago I was hammering away at the stimulus.  Last week the NYT published an article that narrowly criticizes Obama for states planning to use stimulus funds for more suburban and exurban development.  Basically, the need to spend stimulus money quickly and create jobs has led states to pursue "shovel ready" projects in sectors where jobs are easily established - what this means in our suburban nation is construction jobs repairing and expanding highways.  The Times points to a unique tension this creates for Obama as our first president in a generation or more who is committed to urban (re)development.  But what the article should have pointed out is that this is because Obama has inherited a nation where dismantling or curbing our zeal for suburban development is no small task.

A fair criticism of Obama is that at a time when we need exceptionally bold thinking, we're getting a mealy mix of soaring rhetoric, incremental change and frequent perpetuation of a dangerous status quo.  Obama is also currently hamstrung by our federalist system, one in which local development authority reigns.  Short of changing legislation to give more development powers (back) to the federal government, money coming from DC for building infrastructure or creating jobs is spent more or less at the discretion of the states.  That's how we like it, as Americans: local decision-making, local authority, a certain "get off my property, you damn kids!" kind of action.  At this point, it's up to activist and citizens groups to try and stop certain development projects proposed by the various states (such as Texas's planned highway through prairie land).

But we also have to ask ourselves, rather than solely looking to the President on this issue, do we want our states to spend money on public transportation instead of highway expansion?  Can we avoid highway repairs or expansion given current development patterns?  What's realistic and desired?  It's not exactly Obama's responsibility to demand states develop more sustainable projects if voters want more exurban housing and a highway connecting them to downtown Houston, or really need more lanes from Boston to New Hampshire to soothe current commutes.

What does all this have to do with poverty?  Though the suburbs are seeing their increased share of low-income residents, cities still remain the primary home for individuals living in poverty.  Suburban voters have more political clout in Washington, and have more Not-in-My-Backward (NIMBY) power to stop projects such as affordable housing development or rail lines in their neighborhood.  Legislatively, politically and fiscally, cities remain disproportionately responsible for providing for the poor in the U.S., and part of that political reality is that the majority of Americans often want and can get government funds directed to the suburbs to improve schools or provide new middle-class housing and accompanying retail.  Even when public transit investments occur, they might expand commuter lines into the exurbs versus providing more stops in dense but under-served urban areas.

It's true that stimulus spending threatens to reinforce socio-economic inequalities as states spend funds on middle-class citizens who are easier to (re-)train and house and on the neighborhoods in which they live.  But this is in large part because we as Americans want it this way.  "Correcting this imbalance will require [in part] a radical adjustment in how we think of cities and government’s role in them."  Are we up for it?