Why Infrastructure Spending Should Empower Megaregions
The following article was originally published by Lauren Gore at Governing on June 9, 2021.
Federal funding formulas need to evolve to help regional governing bodies to accelerate both large and community-focused projects that have an impact across these large population clusters.
When President Biden assumed office, he brought with him the promise to act quickly on a vast array of interwoven national challenges. After getting much-needed help to communities challenged by COVID-19, passing a comprehensive federal infrastructure package now sits at the top of the president’s agenda.
Changing decades-old formulas for infrastructure funding and how the money is distributed are not new topics for discussion. As a nation, we have been arguing over this approach for more than a generation. While the importance of infrastructure makes intense debates appropriate, one critical element of such policy is often overlooked: the role and importance of large population clusters — “megaregions” — within and between adjoining states. The infrastructure debate must start including a discussion on how to further empower regional governing bodies to effectively accelerate megaregional infrastructure projects already identified as feasible and desired in local communities.
