Washington.--Secretary Henry Cisneros hopes he's created a vision, a blueprint of a Department of Housing and Urban Development that's worth having.
Mr. Cisneros didn't have much choice. Even friends of cities and low-income housing have questioned the effectiveness of the bureaucracy and red-tape-ridden department. The Republican sweep of Congress immediately raised prospects of placing HUD on the butcher block. Then President Clinton, also having read the election results, said: Justify HUD's existence or I'll recommend elimination.
The Cisneros response has been to create an ingenious formula that's part New Federalism, part "reinvented government," part an appeal to the ideal of preserving the sole department of American government devoted to housing, cities and the growing ranks of America's urban poor.
The central reform mechanism: to boil HUD's 60 principal grant programs down to three gigantic block grants that invite state and local officials to fashion their own programs and responses.
As for the Federal Housing Administration, it would be turned into a government-owned but semi-autonomous corporation enjoying dramatically widened power to buy the best technology, hire business talent and act entrepreneurially.
One of Secretary Cisneros' block grants -- the Affordable Housing Fund -- would incorporate most government housing production and rehabilitation programs (except for public housing). It would invite state and local governments to fashion housing strategies appropriate to their needs and apply for funding.
A second block grant -- Housing Certificates for Families and Individuals -- would sweep up all of today's public housing, assisted housing and so-called Section 8 rental assistance. Local governments would allocate these certificates to low-income families, who'd suddenly be free to take them to apartments of their own choice.
The housing vouchers would end public housing as it's known in America. With a phase-in period of three to five years, HUD would be out of the business of directly subsidizing public housing buildings. All the country's 3,400 public housing authorities would be deregulated, obliged to compete in the market for low-income residents.
Well-run public housing authorities would presumably have no problem. But what of the projects plagued by crime, graffiti, abandonment?
If the authorities responsible for them couldn't "get a hold on their management problems," Mr. Cisneros explains, "they'd lose tenants. And that would force decisions on the community -- whether the housing should exist in its present form, whether the buildings themselves are flawed and should be demolished, whether some non-profit or joint venture might run these buildings better."
One's left wondering -- where will the thousands of residents of lost public housing units end up? Won't some become homeless? Are there enough low-cost private units?
The answer is: Localities will have to be more ingenious. But at least they will not be wasting millions of federal dollars to rehabilitate public housing high-rises likely to be vandalized and abandoned again. And HUD, instead of subsidizing bureaucratically rigid and inefficient public housing authorities, will be providing direct housing vouchers to the low-income people who need the assistance.
Indeed, one wonders how the new Congress, short of abruptly terminating all public-housing subsidies, could find a more Republican or market-oriented solution.
Finally, Mr. Cisneros proposes a Community Opportunity Fund to pay for economic revitalization and distressed neighborhood aid now financed by such programs as Community Development Block Grants. "Reverse commute" plans to suburbs, business loans to entrepreneurs to build supermarkets, environmental cleanup of "brown field sites" ripe for redevelopment -- all would be eligible.
There is a semantic problem here -- these won't be block grants given with zero strings attached. They'll actually be what Mr. Cisneros calls "contractual, performance-based grants." Localities will lay out operational plans, fulfilling the grant's broad purposes; HUD will negotiate specific performance goals with them. HUD will also act to guarantee fair housing practices and to make sure such groups as the homeless aren't neglected.
The "reinventing government" crowd is sure to applaud the new approach, citing the flexibility it gives local governments even while maintaining an accountability for using federal taxpayer dollars.
While HUD's present crisis is tied to Washington's new politics, it's not new: The agency's bureaucratic sclerosis has long been obvious. A National Academy of Public Administration last summer reported HUD was suffering an acute case of "program overload" (from 54 programs in 1980 to 200 in 1982).
The overload, the panel observed, saps HUD's resources, muddles priorities, creates impossible expectations and confuses communities. Though praising Secretary Cisneros' personal leadership, the group suggested HUD either slim down to a handful of manageable programs with clear goals, or pass out of existence.
It's still possible the congressional Republicans will want to kill HUD outright. Yet they may find parts of Mr. Cisneros' plan highly appealing.
Indeed, as long as HUD's Democratic "friends" controlled key congressional committees, special-interest lobbies from government-worker unions to the large public housing authorities were positioned to kill sweeping reforms.
Now everything's up for grabs. It's a high-risk game. But one suspects Henry Cisneros may secretly be pleased.
Neal R. Peirce writes a column on state and urban affairs.