Aligning Plans and Resources
Several federal agencies require communities to establish collaborative, data-driven community planning processes to receive federal program resources. A Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy (CEDS) is a roadmap that local and regional stakeholders can use to coordinate priorities and align resources and investments. The EDA CEDS Guidelines provide sufficient flexibility for the resulting plan to align with or even satisfy the strategic planning requirements of other federal programs.
Benefits of Strategic Plan Alignment
In support of local and regional capacity to effectively leverage and invest multiple federal program resources, EDA’s EDI team partnered with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Office of Community Planning and Development (CPD) to develop quick reference materials that communities, regions, and states can use to coordinate their planning processes so as to satisfy the criteria of both agencies. The added value of streamlined strategic planning processes includes:
- Reduce Administrative Burdens: Save regionional planners and stakeholders time and resources by co-leveraging respective planning processes and aligning strategic priorities.
- Enhance Collaboration: Introduce and incorporate new perspectives and methods.
- Optimize Investments: Leverage collective capacity to address complex challenges.
Reduced Administrative Burden
These guides encourage and incentivize EDA Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy (CEDS) and HUD Consolidated Plan grantees to coordinate their planning processes to satisfy the planning requirements of both agencies.
By choosing this path, local and regional governments and their community and economic development partners expend fewer resources on administering processes, leaving more time and energy to plan for and invest multiple federal resources in support of effective, comprehensive solutions.
- Reduced Burden (PDF)
Enhanced Collaboration
Undertaking coordinated, multi-purpose strategic planning requires direct partnerships between local and regional practitioners and stakeholders. The EDA-HUD joint guidance encourages each agency’s grantees and their partners to collaboratively establish strategic plans that reflect local and regional economic and community development needs and opportunities, and optimize the investment of federal, state, and local resources in sustainable, innovative projects.
- Enhanced Collaboration (PDF)
Optimized Investments
Local and regional strategic planning partnerships enhance the capacity of participating EDA and HUD grantees to make strategic investments that generate and sustain multiple benefits for their communities and regions. This form of collaboration ensures that projects previously designed and implemented under separate processes are implemented together as complementary components of a broader strategic vision.
Plan Alignment Partners and Resources
The following linked webpages provide more information about communities and regions that have aligned a CEDS with regional plans for rural development, hazard mitigation, transportation, and other aspects of regional economic development.
- Aligning CEDS with other Federally Sponsored Regional Plans: This August 2017 presentation was hosted by the National Association of Development Organizations (NADO) Research Foundation as part of its “Stronger CEDS, Stronger Regions” program. Visit the CEDS Central resource library for more examples from regional organizations that successfully coordinated their CEDS plan with other federal planning processes, including these:
- Recommendations for Linking CEDS and Hazard Mitigation Plans: Building Economic Resilience in the Kerr Tar Region. This report summarizes findings from a technical assistance project conducted by NADO and the University of Louisville, to identify ways for an EDA Economic Development District to align its CEDS and its FEMA Hazard Mitigation Plans.
- USDA Rural Development Strategic Economic and Community Development (SECD): This program is authorized through a Farm Bill provision that offers priority set asides under several programs for projects that align with multi-jurisdictional strategic economic development plans, including the EDA CEDS.
- Coordinating Local Planning Efforts: the Con Plan and CEDS. Resources described in the case study above can also be found on the HUD Exchange, the Department’s central resource and assistance site for community partners, the HUD Exchange. Similar opportunities exist to align EDA CEDS plans with HUD Annual Action Plans required for Community Development Block Grant funds (including Disaster Recovery, CDBG-DR).
Contact EDA headquarters with questions about Economic Development Integration at the following email address: edi@eda.gov.
For information about how your community or region can request Economic Development Integration assistance from EDA, contact your Regional Economic Development Integrator.