The Atlanta City Council has accepted a series of 13 recommendations to support the Neighborhood Reinvestment Initiative (NRI) – a $10 billion plan to improve community well-being and connectivity in underserved areas.
The NRI was launched in 2025, originally as a $5 billion initiative. Since then, the projected budget has bloomed as the city’s vision for improving living conditions for disconnected neighborhoods has expanded. Atlanta leaders have selected seven priority neighborhood areas that have been historically impacted by harsh systemic challenges and are ideally situated to capitalize on local opportunities and leadership potential.
The program will utilize eight existing tax allocation districts (TADs) to raise money to support key redevelopment projects. These initiatives will support eight core building blocks that will serve as the benchmarks for success, marking improvements in living quality and connectivity for neighborhoods. These include:
- Affordable housing.
- Public safety.
- Youth development and education.
- Public spaces.
- Transit.
- Health and wellness.
- Economic opportunity.
- Dependable government.
By prioritizing sustained, concentrated investments in these neighborhoods, the city anticipates that it will transform these areas into cultural and residential hubs. Building resident support networks through these projects is part of the city’s plans to intentionally implement and align systems to benefit the local populace. Ideally, the systems implemented in these initial focus areas will spread throughout the rest of Atlanta in the coming years.
The 13 recommendations approved as part of the NRI’s next phase of implementation include the following.
Firstly, the NRI Commission will ensure that all project priorities are set by communities. These include the residents, their organizing groups and any future governing bodies.
In addition, the Commission must rely on continual community input to guide implementation of the plan’s holistic vision. Relying on local Neighborhood Partner Organizations (NPO) will prove critical in engaging the community to help identify projects, priorities, decision-making and implementation. The city must continue to promote the project review process established with NPOs to facilitate this work.
The Commission must ensure communities remain accessible without displacing legacy residents and small businesses. As the plan catalyzes these neighborhoods, measures must be taken to mitigate adverse impacts to the local population and ensure anti-displacement policies and equitable development frameworks are in place.
To further support anti-displacement, the Commission recommends strengthening its toolkit through the city’s collaboration with the Partnership for Southern Equity (PSE) and parters with similar experience. The Commission should also continue to explore the feasibility and impact of these strategies and maintaining community focus through NPOs and other engagement mechanisms.
In order to best support these infrastructure improvements, the Commission recommends pulling funds from a range of sources to secure long-term success. While TADs – alongside private investments – will remain the primary vehicle for funding the NRI, the city will be encouraged to emphasize infrastructure investment and monitoring project progress to maintain sustainability.
The Commission has also recommended the establishment of an independent governing body to guide NRI implementation and oversight. By creating governance principles and a long-term framework through a cross-sector coalition, the body would operate as the hub for the initiative to maintain sustainability for years to come. The resulting system would support sustainable implementation, codify structures and processes and adapt over time as needed.
Initial public investment is a highlight of the plan, laying the groundwork to catalyze capital from private and philanthropic sources. By having the city take the first step, other partners will be encouraged to join in and provide their own supporting investments.
Notably, the Commission emphasizes the need to keep all funding for the NRI local, rather than relying on state or federal dollars. The city should seek out new public funding sources to complement private and philanthropic investments. This would require seeking programmatic support to cover associated costs and services. New sources would need to be local and used to support capital, programmatic and operating costs.
Currently, funding sources for programmatic support are few and far between. Considering its scarcity, the Commission recommends that any deployable capital or programmatic funding should be used for human services, community building and anti-displacement programs.
The Commission notes that TADs, in combination with other sources, can realize the NRI vision. Capitalizing on that opportunity would involve extending the timeframe of select TADs to generate additional revenue, returning portions of each taxing jurisdiction’s increment through future payments and that TADs negotiations should continue outside the purview of the Commission.
Balanced growth must remain a cornerstone of the plan. The city must distribute resources equitably to maximize regional benefits. To implement equitable allocation, the city should diversify public funding tools to support citywide initiatives and use specialized sources to alleviate pressure on flexible funds.
The final recommendation included in the document revolves around returning TAD funds back to jurisdictions through Payments in Lieu of Taxes (PILOT) or other similar methods. In addition, the city should consider creating an NRI Trust Fund to receive those PILOT payments and better reallocate resources to recipients in need.
Photo by K from Pexels
For more of the latest from the expansive government marketplace, check Government Market News daily for new stories, insights and profiles from public sector professionals. Check out our national contracting newsletter here.
