Dallas selected for Vacant Properties Technical Assistance scholarship

The City of Dallas is one of four cities chosen to receive the Center for Community Progress’ Technical Assistance Scholarship Program (TASP). The other cities are Detroit, Gary, IN; and Trenton, NJ. Through TASP, the national nonprofit Center for Community Progress helps local leaders develop new strategies to address property blight, vacancy and abandonment.

Community Progress’ work in Dallas will focus primarily on evaluating existing local and state policies related to code enforcement. Based on its findings, the organization will offer recommendations for policy changes or strategies to help city government more effectively implement existing policies to prevent property deterioration and abandonment.

“The timing of the Center for Community Progress Technical Assistance Scholarship Program is perfect,” said Dallas Director of Code Compliance Kris Sweckard. “It provides us with additional tools and strategies, primarily based upon data and policies, to help us reach our objectives.”

Cities requested assistance in one or more of TASP’s key issue areas, including strategic code enforcement, data and information systems and vacant land maintenance and reuse strategies. Proposed projects are reviewed on a range of criteria, including the potential for innovation that other cities can learn from, demonstrated leadership to implement reform and overall need.”

“Over the past year, the City of Dallas has aggressively pushed the development of inter-departmental strategies for tackling vacancies and the abandonment of properties,” Sweckard said. “This effort allows the City to partner more strategically with non-governmental entities working to reduce blight and improve quality of life in our neighborhoods.”

Since 2010, the Flint, MI-based Center for Community Progress has provided technical assistance to more than 100 communities in 22 states. Community Progress launched TASP in early 2014 in response to two needs: the need to develop fresh approaches to problem properties that could become models for cities to replicate; and the need to provide individual cities with affordable, high-quality guidance in the fight to remediate blighted, vacant properties.