Press Release

March 18, 2011
SENATOR CARDIN JOINS HUD OFFICIALS IN ANNOUNCING $213,000 GRANT TO TRANSFORM CENTRAL WEST BALTIMORE NEIGHBORHOOD
Pedestal Gardens is one of 17 to receive first of HUD Choice Neighborhood Grants

BALTIMORE – U.S. Senator Ben Cardin (D-MD) today joined U.S. Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Regional Administrator Jane C.W. Vincent, Assistant Secretary Sandra Henriquez and Deputy Assistant Secretary Carol Galante along with U.S. Congressman Elijah Cummings (MD-7) to announce that Baltimore will receive a $213,000 Planning Grant from HUD to transform Pedestal Gardens into a new viable and sustainable mixed-income neighborhood.

“Jubilee Baltimore, Inc. and the Baltimore House Authority, along with other partners, have a strong vision for redeveloping Pedestal Gardens so that it will become a vibrant city neighborhood that will attract families and businesses” said Senator Cardin. “I applaud HUD’s commitment to this project and to ensuring that Baltimore has affordable housing that will help revitalize this Central West Baltimore neighborhood.”

The Planning Grant is part of HUD’s new Choice Neighborhoods Initiative , in which a total of $4 million was awarded to 17 communities nationwide. HUD’s Choice Neighborhoods Initiative is a centerpiece of the Obama Administration’s interagency Neighborhood Revitalization Initiative to transform distressed neighborhoods into sustainable, mixed-income neighborhoods with the affordable housing, safe streets and good schools every family needs.

“President Obama has said that there is no greater economic policy than one that invests in our children’s future and helps America out-educate the world. But that’s not possible if we leave a whole generation of children behind in our poorest neighborhoods,” said Assistant Secretary Henriquez.

Congress approved the Choice Neighborhoods Initiative with the passage of HUD’s FY 2010 budget, allowing HUD to use $65 million in funding to provide competitive grants to assist in the transformation, rehabilitation and preservation of public housing and privately owned HUD-assisted housing. 

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