U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Julian Castro returned Wednesday to Atlanta, where he praised the city’s work in pioneering successful mixed-income housing developments.
He spoke at an event on federal housing policies that included Mayor Kasim Reed, former Mayor Shirley Franklin and one-time Atlanta Housing Authority CEO Renee Lewis Glover, among others. In the early 1990s, Glover and developer Egbert Perry helped transform a distressed public housing project into the Centennial Place mixed-income community. Centennial was the first recipient of HUD’s HOPE VI grant and became a national model for urban revitalization.
Castro, who is seen as a potential running mate for Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, credited President Barack Obama for his work in incorporating housing, education, transit and related programs in a broad neighborhood revitalization initiative. As part of that effort, Castro visited Atlanta in September to award a $30 million Choice Neighborhoods grant to the city.
“The great thing is the work that was done at Centennial is a precursor to all of that,” Castro said at the National Center for Civil and Human Rights. “It really set the stage.”
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