Domestic Housing and Community Development Issues for Planning

Many serious housing and community development problems face the United States during the 1980's. The number of households will increase 19 percent during the 1980's, placing greater demand on the housing supply. Americans continue to migrate to the South and West, and increasingly to rural areas. Population redistribution is responsible for a wide range of present urban problems, such as the concentration of disadvantaged groups within central cities. Rural problems, such as inadequate public facilities and services, are also created. Three broad areas of concern that have guided the Federal Goverment's participation in housing and community development include the recognition that it had: (1) a responsibility to maintain and promote economic stability; (2) a social obligation to help provide for those in need; and (3) an emerging interest in how the nation's communities develop. Two fundamental policies that the Government is concerned with are the private home financing system and Government-subsidized housing for low-income families. The Government's concern over community growth and development has steadily expanded to include neighborhoods, entire cities, counties, and preplanned new communities. These efforts have been designed to assist cities solve urban problems and to encourage them to develop more orderly, attractive, and livable communities. Attention has also been focused on increasing the quality of life in rural communities.