Evaluation of Title IX SEED (Sudden and Severe Economic Dislocation) Program Inducements and Enhancements on Multi-Tenant Buildings as a Component in Local Economic Recovery. Part 1. Policy Analysis

摘要

Plant closings have affected many communities, especially in the Northeast, leaving unemployed workers and empty buildings in their wake. The Economic Development Administration responded with its Title IX Sudden and Severe Economic Dislocation Program (SSED). The research project looks at the part of the SSED program used to fund building-based economic recovery strategies in which vacant industrial buildings were converted to incubators or multi-tenant buildings to provide low-cost space to small businesses. Eight SSED-funded and five non-funded sites were examined through interviews of tenants, building managers, local agency staff and others to determine the impact of EDA's SSED program inducements and enhancements on tenant firms, employment (especially on displaced workers) and the local economy. In general, the program funding seemed to work best by focusing federal funds on building acquisition and renovation, releasing local funds to design and manage the enhancements. The study documents the considerable diversity in provision of local enhancements, and the fatal flaws communities should avoid in undertaking building-based recovery strategies.