Urban Development Act Of 1970

The Sixties may have been swingin’, but one thing that wasn’t so swingin’ was how hard it was for some homeowners and business owners to get insurance in high-crime areas. Insurance companies thought it was just too risky, what with all the crime-related claims and losses.

In 1970, the Department of Urban Housing and Development—HUD, to its friends—said, “This is no good.” And hence, the “Urban Development Act of 1970” was born. The point of the act was not only to help with the insurance thing—though it did that—but also to promote economic growth in the United States’ urban areas. Sounds like a pretty tall order, right? That’s why they broke it down into a few distinct areas where they believed HUD could actually have an impact. Let’s taco ‘bout those areas, shall we?

First of all, this act provided a federal guarantee for insurance companies that insured those in high-crime areas. The government doesn’t actually provide the insurance. Instead, it provides a little insurance for those providing the insurance. Beyond that, though, this act also expanded government rent subsidies for low-income and not-quite-low-income-but-def-not-rich households, and it infused a bunch of money into actual urban development through bonds, grants, loans, and other U.S. Government-backed financing methods. Some land use and permitting laws were changed to attract developers to certain areas, and since the federal government was also working with the developers buying that land, Title VII projects, as they were called, were seen as a solid sign of commitment to improving those areas.