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Initiative to help business climate
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by Courtney Johnson
Monday, March 26, 2007
Six new initiatives aimed at improving Madison's economy and providing extra support for low-income families were approved at last week's City Council meeting.
The first of them was $30,000 for the Department of Civil Rights to conduct fair housing compliance checks. The Council also approved an initiative to provide $121,000 to Project Home, which provides affordable housing in the Allied Drive area.
"In Allied, we're trying to do two things which are difficult to achieve at the same time," said George Twigg, communications director for Mayor Dave Cieslewicz. "One is to maintain affordability in the neighborhood, and the other is to spur development and improvement in the neighborhood."
Twigg said accomplishing these two goals at the same time can be difficult because, as a neighborhood develops and improves, housing prices usually rise.
According to Twigg, these kinds of initiatives rarely receive attention because they are usually uncontroversial and do not require much debate.
And at this particular City Council meeting, these proposals were overshadowed by a long debate over a proposal from City Council President Austin King, which called for full public financing of aldermanic, judicial and mayoral campaigns.
Ray Allen, who is running against Cieslewicz in this April's mayoral race, said he thinks these proposals may have a minimal effect on life on Allied Drive.
"The city takes a property management approach to quality of life problems on Allied Drive, and what we've always wanted to do was support the Affordable Housing Trust Fund because it's important for long-term residents to be able to own homes there," Allen spokesperson Semmi Pasha said.
Other proposals that were also approved were $20,000 for the Childhood Stabilization Fund, up to $150,000 for building a new headquarters for the Urban League, $15,000 for an African American Black Business Association survey and $75,000 for the Building Trades apprenticeships program.
The apprenticeship program recruits low-income Madison residents for trade apprenticeship programs. The program aims to help poor residents stay competitive in the job market.
"It is mostly focused on Allied, but it is not exclusive to Allied, but that is where most of the need is," Twigg said.
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