News

9/28/18 An Advisory Services Panel of national land use and urban planning experts representing the Urban Land Institute (ULI) spent the week in Sacramento diving into the area around the Meadowview and Florin Road light rail stations. Their aim is to provide unvarnished outside strategic recommendations of how to encourage the revitalization of a commercial corridor that has the benefit of being on a light rail line and includes multiple properties owned by Sacramento Regional Transit. The panel is one of only three in the country that ULI is hosting.

9/28/18 California’s historic wildfires in 2018 may be a sign of more devastating summers ahead.  The state’s wildfire season is starting earlier and lasting longer, by about 2 ½ months since in the 1970s. Fifteen of the 20 largest wildfires in California history have occurred since the year 2000. This increased fire occurrence is also costing Californians more in loss of life and property, health care for air quality-related illness, insurance rate increases, and impacts on forest-based businesses.

8/30/18 In the past few years as the state has faced historic drought and damaging wildfire, restoring the resiliency of our regional forests and watersheds has become increasingly important. At the regional level, the Tahoe-Central Sierra Initiative (TCSI) has championed the goal of improving the health and durability of our forest ecosystems and communities. On August 7, CAL FIRE announced $27.5 million investment in forest health projects.

8/30/18 The City of Elk Grove has approved $1.5 million for Startup Elk Grove, a program geared towards encouraging entrepreneurs, helping existing startups that are looking to grow, and building a base of incubator supporters such as co-working spaces.

7/31/18 As the Sacramento region recovers from the recession and development increases, it’s increasingly important for us to grow smartly, and create vibrant communities in all parts of our region. Inclusive public spaces consider all modes of transportation and access in order to foster healthy and resilient communities. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, a leading national health philanthropy, recently partnered with the Gehl Institute to study healthy public spaces and develop a framework of four principles to guide decision making.

7/31/18 The Sacramento region got a big boost in flood protection funding this month, receiving $1.8 billion in federal funds. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers investment provides the final funding needed to complete multiple flood protection projects in the region, including levee work and raising the Folsom Dam. These projects, along with a separate levee project along the Natomas Basin, will provide Sacramento with a 300-year flood protection level.

The U.S. Department of Treasury has certified 63 census tracts designated as Opportunity Zones in our region that will provide multiple areas for private investment in low-income communities. The Opportunity Zones program is a recently-established community development program created by Congress to encourage long-term investments in low-income urban and rural communities, as part of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017.

The Cities of Rancho Cordova and Roseville have been awarded a combined $1.88 million in funding from the State Department of Housing and Community Development for the Infill Infrastructure Grant Program (IIG), which is funded by Prop 1 – the Housing and Emergency Shelter Act of 2006. Rancho Cordova’s Mather Veterans Village (Phase III) will receive $624,551 and will be developed by Mercy Housing. The Village will include 50 supportive housing units for veterans. Roseville’s Main Street Plaza Apartments will receive $1,259,709 and are being developed by Meta Housing Corporation.

Have an innovative idea you want to test in the Sacramento region? Looking for a place to launch a tested and performance-based project? Want to help our region emit fewer emissions? Four new competitive grant programs are available this summer with over $12.5 million in available funding. The grants vary from temporary activations under $10,000 to large infrastructure projects and are available to partners across the region.