Orange County marks community development week, highlights housing and infrastructure funding

Federal community development dollars are still underwriting the kind of work Orange County says residents notice most: water and sewer upgrades, ADA improvements, senior center renovations and affordable housing. Orange County Executive Steve Neuhaus and the Orange County Office of Community Development used National Community Development Week, observed April 6-10, to put a number on that pipeline, saying the county expects about $1.69 million in Community Development Block Grant money and $1.09 million in HOME funds for 2026.

The county framed the money as more than bookkeeping. Its Office of Community Development says the mission is to use federal, state and local funds to improve quality of life for low- and moderate-income residents through public facilities, infrastructure and affordable housing. In Orange County, that means projects that can be hard to finance through local taxes alone, especially in municipalities dealing with growth pressure, aging infrastructure and housing costs at the same time.

The federal programs behind that work have deep roots. Orange County says it has received CDBG funding on an annual formula basis since 1974, the year the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development launched the program. HUD says CDBG is designed to provide decent housing, suitable living environments and expanded economic opportunities, principally for low- and moderate-income people. The county says HOME funds have been allocated annually since 1992, after HUD created the program in 1990 under the Cranston-Gonzalez National Affordable Housing Act.

Orange County also pointed to the leverage built into HOME. The county says every $1 of HUD HOME money invested in a housing development project generates $17 in local funding, a ratio that helps explain why county officials are treating the program as a financing tool rather than a symbolic grant line. The county’s October 2025 announcement of more than $1 million in CDBG awards to municipalities showed how that money moves into concrete local work, while the county’s broader planning documents tie the annual grant cycle to public facilities, infrastructure and affordable housing preservation and production.

That matters because the projects funded through these grants do not always draw public attention until they are missing. Sidewalks, accessibility upgrades, utility fixes and housing development shape daily life in Orange County for years, and the county’s message was clear: if federal support shrinks, the burden of replacing it would fall on local governments already trying to modernize old systems and keep housing within reach. HUD marked CDBG’s 50th anniversary in 2024, and Orange County’s observance underscored how central those dollars remain to county budgeting and planning.