Obama’s HUD Pick Spot On

The housing industry is applauding President-elect Barack Obama’s pick of Shaun Donovan to head the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Donovan has shown his commitment to quality affordable housing for low- and moderate-income households while serving as director of the New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development, where he has been responsible for leading the effort to build and preserve 165,000 affordable housing units for 500,000 New Yorkers, and as deputy assistant secretary for multifamily housing at HUD during the Clinton administration.

“We need to approach the old challenge of affordable housing with new energy, new ideas, and a new, efficient style of leadership. We need to understand that the old ways of looking at our cities just won’t do. That means promoting cities as the backbone of regional growth by not only solving the problems in our cities, but seizing the opportunities in our growing suburbs, exurbs, and metropolitan areas,” Obama said when naming Donovan as the next HUD secretary on Saturday, Dec. 13.
If confirmed by the Senate, Donovan certainly has the track record and leadership needed to reinvigorate the troubled agency and put quality affordable housing back on the national agenda.