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Community
Development - Housing
Community
development is a term that generally connotes an area's success
toward meeting objectives that are commonly agreed to be fundamental
imperatives for long term community health. Examples of these
imperatives include safe and affordable housing, dependable
infrastructure, an excellent workforce, diversified job opportunities,
a vibrant downtown, services to senior citizens, good public
transportation, rapid access to excellent heath care, clean
water and air.
Since
1965 the Southwestern Commission has assisted its member units
with their efforts to improve their community assets and overall
amenity profiles. We have packaged financing for libraries,
airports, water and sewer systems, information highway access
and numerous other community development initiatives.
This
section, however, deals mostly with the safe and affordable
housing imperative of community health. Workforce, infrastructure,
services to senior citizens and transportation are addressed
in other portions of this web site.
Our
expertise in housing exists in the form of professional staff
who are technically skilled in project planning, securing
funding, and project administration. The Commission's staff
maintains up-to-date knowledge of the region's housing needs
and the available sources of financial assistance to meet
these needs.
For
example, Commission staff is considered technically expert
with the US Department of Housing and Urban Development's
Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) Program. CDBG is
designed to give assistance for the rehabilitation or replacement
of substandard homes owned by low-income, elderly and/or disabled
citizens. It is important to note that one must be a homeowner
and meet income guidelines to participate. more
about the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) in western
NC
Links
are provided herein to numerous sources of outside resources
for local housing projects. These links include, among others,
the NC Housing
Finance Agency, the Western NC Housing Partnership, the Southwestern NC Human Services
Directory, the Rural
Development Administration-USDA, the NC
Division of Community Assistance (CDBG) and the NC
Rural Economic Development Center.
The
project list
details many of the higher profile community development projects
assisted by Commission staff during the past four decades.
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to Community & Economic Development home
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