UN Habitat
III’s “new urban agenda” coming to you by
Bonner Cohen, 10/26/16
With an
enthusiastic call for “sustainable urban development,” the United Nations has
adopted a far-reaching document intended as a blueprint for the future of cities
around the world. Described by the UN as an “inclusive, action-oriented, and
concise document,” the “New Urban Agenda” (NUA) was approved on Oct. 21, the
final day of the UN’s Habitat III conference in Quito, Ecuador.
The
NUA, the UN proclaims, “will guide the next twenty years of sustainable and
transformative urban development worldwide.” “It is a vision,” the UN explains,
“of pluralistic, sustainable, disaster-resilient societies that foster green
economic growth.” The centerpiece of the NUA is the promotion of “compact
cities,” in which people will have little choice but to live in densely
populated, high-rise buildings in order to lower their impact on the
environment.
According
to UN figures, some 30,000 people attended Habitat III, 10,000 of whom were
international visitors, representing 167 countries.
New Urban Agenda
In
keeping with long-standing UN tradition, the Habitat III conference was
convened to address a “crisis.” This one involves the problems facing cities.
They are said to require “urgent action.” And who better than the United
Nations, aided by a coterie of self-described “urban exports” and
“stakeholders” could provide the top-down solutions that will make the world’s
cities a better place to live in the decades to come? Among the commitments
contained in the New Urban Agenda are:
Ensure environmental sustainability, by promoting
clean energy and sustainable use of land and resources in urban development; by
protecting ecosystems and biodiversity, including adopting healthy lifestyles
in harmony with nature; by promoting sustainable consumption and production
patterns; by building urban resilience, by reducing disaster risks; and by
mitigating and adapting to climate change.
And:
Readdress the way we plan, finance, develop, govern,
and manage cities and human settlements, recognizing sustainable urban and
territorial development as essential to the achievement of sustainable
development and prosperity for all.
Quito Implementation Plan
For
all its grandiose pronouncements, the UN can’t force anybody to do anything.
Knowing the UN lacks an enforcement mechanism that could compel cities and
their residents to change their ways, numerous speakers at the conference
emphasized the importance of converting the vision of the NUA into reality. To
that end, delegates to Habitat III adopted the Quito Implementation Plan (QIP).
“These voluntary commitments seek to be concrete actions, measurable and
achievable, focused on implementation and with great depth of information for
future accountability and transparency,” the UN says.
All
of this may seem like little more than the typical blather served up by the
chattering classes, whose members have far too much time on their hands.
Unfortunately, the New Urban Agenda needs to be taken seriously thanks to a
little-noticed rule being cooked up by Obama administration appointees at the
U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).
Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing
Indeed,
deep in the bowels of HUD, plans are underway that will make the pronouncements
of Habitat III look like child’s play. As Stanley Kurtz of National Review Online has pointed
out, HUD’s proposed “Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH) rule is “arguably
the most radical, transformative” initiative the Obama administration has ever
undertaken. AFFH all but eliminates the independence of suburbs, towns, and
small cities in the U.S. by forcing them to address supposed “imbalances” in
the racial, ethnic, and class composition of their greater metropolitan areas.
Under AFFH, suburbs that accept grant money from HUD will have to change their
zoning codes and build high-density, low-income housing for groups HUD deems
are “underrepresented.”
As
NRO points out, “Suburbs may
even be forced to relocate planned schools, transportation hubs, and business
districts to answer to the federal bureaucracy’s ideas of racial, ethnic, and
economic ‘balance.’” What’s more, unelected regional councils composed of HUD bureaucrats,
housing advocates, and other “stakeholders” will oversee and enforce the
scheme. Local elected officials and ordinary taxpayers will be shunted aside
and will find themselves powerless in opposing the edicts of the feds and their
henchmen.
AFFH
is nothing short of federal zoning of America’s suburbs, with the goal of de
facto annexation of those suburbs into central cities. When combined with the
Obama administration’s “Waters of the United States” (WOTUS) rule, which
creates an EPA-led regulatory structure for federal zoning of rural areas, AFFH
will result in Washington calling the shots on housing and land-use decisions
throughout the U.S.
The
administrative regulatory state, which allows federal agencies to issue rules
and regulations that have the force of law behind them, is far and away the
biggest threat to personal liberty in the country. In the spirit of Habitat
III, but with real power behind it, Washington’s crushing bureaucracy is poised
to go where globalists at the UN and elsewhere could only dream of going.
https://www.cfact.org/2016/10/26/un-habitat-iiis-new-urban-agenda-coming-to-you/
Comments
It’s time
to repeal the Civil Rights Act and replace it with the truth. The truth is that it is no longer necessary
and has become harmful and dangerous. It presumes that “protected groups” are
somehow inferior and need to be protected.
The facts remain that these groups are not inferior, but are subjected
to the same “normal curve” of abilities common to all human beings. The US needs to declare that we are a
meritocracy and continue to encourage all other countries to adopt this truth,
to enable their own citizens to have the freedom to be self-supporting. This requires restoring the family as the
basic economic unit of humanity.
Norb
Leahy, Dunwoody GA Tea Party Leader
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