Teaming Up to Fight Blight and Promote Sustainability: an Academic-Governmental Collaboration for Sustainable Development

This article describes a town-gown collaboration in the capital region of New York State between two academic institutions, Albany Law School and the University at Albany, and two city governments, those of the cities of Albany and Schenectady. Through this initiative, students and faculty from these institutions work closely with city government officials to develop and implement policy initiatives to help those cities combat blight in ways that are practical, feasible, scalable, and sustainable. Because blight is unquestionably a sustainability issue, strategies that can address, minimize, and even prevent blight can help communities address long-term environmental, economic, and cultural sustainability.