Here’s a chart that just happens to almost perfectly coincide with my lifespan. It shows the amount of Federal HUD dollars that have been spent in Saint Paul over the last 40 years.
As you can see, there is something of a trend.
The three lines represent three different pots of money: Community Development Block Grants (CDBG), Home Investment Partnership dollars, and Emergency Solutions Grants.
It is also worth noting that these are nominal dollars, not adjusted for inflation. In other words, $19M was the amount of CDBG finding in 1977 dollars, which is about….
[wait for it]
… $80M in today’s dollars.
If you consider that Saint Paul will receive about $8M in annual HUD funding in 2020, that represents quite a drop-off.
If you are interested in learning more about how the HUD dollars are spent == things like homeless prevention, economic development, and affordable housing construction — check out this entire presentation, courtesy of Saint Paul Planning and Economic Development. If you have thoughts about Saint Paul’s spending priority in particular, you can take a organizational or individual survey!