How to Make the Best Use of Funding for Infrastructure Projects
(Source: Unsplash.)
More than $1.2 trillion is queued up to be spent on American infrastructure in the next five years, a huge increase over normal funding cycles. This is an opportunity for local governments to make solid investments in infrastructure, but also a risk that the money could be spent badly, making communities poorer in the long run.
One of the most important elements of this funding bill for local governments to recognize is it is not ongoing support. It is one-time grant funding and should be used wisely, like water in a desert, instead of just another budget item.
But there are profound opportunities to shore up existing systems which can buy your community time to get stronger. Windfall payments can be used to prioritize maintenance over expansion or install underground infrastructure rather than fragile, high-maintenance, above-ground projects. Defaulting to maintaining underground infrastructure in pre-1940s neighborhoods is a strategy with many potential payoffs.
A new one-hour Strong Towns course walks you through exactly what to do if you want to bring the best strategies for optimizing infrastructure grants to your community. Featured speakers include Strong Towns President and Founder Charles Marohn, plus special guest Beth Osborne, director of Transportation for America. Check out that course here.
We’re giving you a sneak peak of the class resources today though, in the form of a handy, printable Action Guide.
The guide offers four key tips for making the most of the infrastructure avalanche:
Recognize it as One-Time Money.
Do No Harm.
Default to Resilience.
Finesse Strategic Investments Where Possible.
In addition to going in-depth on each of those items, there’s also a bonus section with advice for communities hoping to bring resilience to infrastructure managed by their local government.
Get your guide now and, if you want to go deeper, take our new class, “Infrastructure Avalanche: How to Make the Best Use of State and Federal Funding,” over at the Strong Towns Academy.
