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AHI's Exchange Series is a periodic series of dialogues which brings together one expert from the global south and one from the global north to discuss a common theme, with the view of exploring what principles are universal across nations and environments. The Exchange Series engages as participants a diverse group of industry leaders, academic experts, and students from the global north and global south. The series explores some of the most challenging urban housing, finance and infrastructure issues facing the world’s cities.
AHI's Exchange Series is made possible through a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
If you would like to join us for future dialogues, or to suggest topics or presenters, please see the form below.
Exchange 4
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Local Autonomy vs. State Controls in Urban Planning: in search of balance in the US and in Brazil
Presenters: Edesio Fernandes (Visiting Fellow at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy), and Gerald Frug (Harvard Law School), USA
Place: Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, 113 Brattle Street, Cambridge, MA 02138 (http://www.lincolninst.edu/)
Printable flyer here.
Presentation by Edesio Fernandes on Brazil available here.
This Exchange discussed local power and local autonomy vis-à-vis state and federal levels and the possible formats of city and metropolitan management, competences and conditions for urban, land and housing policies.
The guest speakers agreed on the fundamental importance of the legal-institutional framework to improve the conditions of land, housing and urban governance, and they shared the basic idea that there should be better state-local articulation in their respective countries. However, whereas in the US case there is an argument that local government should be given more legal powers over territorial organization matters, in the Brazilian case it is argued that local government has excessive powers.
Is there a right legal structure? What are the challenges and implications?
The presenters compared and contrasted the institutional designs in force in their respective countries, with vigorous input from a diverse range of particpants.
A summary of the discussion may be seen on the Lincoln Institute of Land Polciy weblog.
Edesio Fernandes, a Visiting Fellow at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy and a member of DPU Associates (Development Planning Unit at University College London) is a lawyer specializing in urban planning and management; land reform and informal settlements regularization; constitutional law and human rights in developing countries. He was Director of Land Affairs at the Brazilian Ministry of Cities, and is a member of UN-HABITAT’s Advisory Group on Forced Evictions. Among other publications, he is the author of Law and Urban Change in Brazil (1995) and editor (1998, with Ann Varley) of Illegal Cities – Law and Urban Change in Developing Countries. |
Gerald Frug is the Louis D. Brandeis Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. His specialty is local government law. Educated at the University of California at Berkeley and Harvard Law School, he worked as Special Assistant to the Chairman of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and as Health Services Administrator of the City of New York. He is the author of dozens of articles on local government, a casebook on local government law, and two books: City Bound: How States Stifle Urban Innovation (2008, with David Barron) and City Making: Building Communities without Building Walls (1999). |
Exchange 3
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Lucky You: Dealing with Legacy Inventory
Presenters: Maria Tereza Diniz (Program officer SEHAB, Sao Paulo), Brazil, and Mark Maloney (Boston World Partnerships), USA
Place: AHI Conference Room, 38 Chauncy Street, Suite 600, Boston, MA 02111
Printable flyer here
Housing and urban development properties, as we all know, endure for decades and take years in their creation. Yet municipal governments and mayors come and go, often halfway through the development cycle for an important civic project or comprehensive renewal or redesign plan. Every city thus has some inventory of legacy projects – long since completed and operating, or early in their operati ons, or even partway through a painful and protracted development-approval process. Some properties and even some subsidy or financing schemes are simply discarded if they are in early stages while others, i ncluding housing inventory, can end up left in limbo.
Meanwhile, appointed public servants are expected to deal with the past – whether or not they favored the property, it exists and is part of the city – and plan the future developments. Therein lies the tension: How should one deal with the housing inventory that is passed from one local administration to the next?
What are the challenges?
Mark Maloney and Maria Tereza Diniz shared their respective experiences with lively participant discussion.
Global South |
Global North |
Maria Tereza Diniz, is a key executive within Sao Paulo’s Municipal Housing Secretariat (Sehab), which also oversees Sao Paulo’s inventory of previous and current slum redevelopment projects, including the Guarapiranga and Cingapura developments throughout the city. As a Program Coordinator for the transformation of Paraisópolis, Sao Paulo's second largest favela, with over 80,000 residents, she manages an investment of R$ 350 million in partnership with state and federal government. |
Mark Maloney,has spent more than 35 years in startups and change management through community economic development, as an entrepreneur (founder of a successful property management company), director of the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA) from 2000 through 2006, and currently focusing on international economic development. In all of these roles he has presided over or been involved in major and complex projects – each involving legacy properties and challenges that involve questions of how much of the past we should preserve. |
Contact and Suggestions: Please use the form below, which will be sent to us through "Bluehost.com". You may also contact Rosabelli Coelho-Keyssar by telephone at 617-502-5980.