The new infrastructure package could be one of the nation’s most consequential investments in equitable wellbeing — but only if we make it so.
In a new Viewpoint essay for Planning magazine, FFI’s CEO Katya Fels Smyth and Brookings Senior Fellow Xavier de Souza Briggs make the case: we must reckon with how past investments have been used to institutionalize and deepen inequities and make concerted decisions to steer funding into the creation of a built environment that provides universal access to wellbeing.
Infrastructure investments aren’t neutral. Imagine a future where people’s wellbeing is the starting place for how decisions are made about what, where, when and even whether we build. Our new tool is a step towards that future.
Brookings Metro Senior Fellow Xavier de Souza Briggs and Full Frame Initiative CEO Katya Fels Smyth outline a framework grounded in the Wellbeing Blueprint to guide new investments in the built environment.
Communities, organizations and individuals across the country are already advancing structural change so everyone has a fair shot. The Wellbeing in Action map captures innovations and examples by location, issue area and Wellbeing Blueprint principles.