Partnership Projects

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on a framework for evaluating the success of public-private partnerships in housing and community development.

GAO found that: (1) the need for a project could be considered in terms of the difference between existing and desirable conditions; (2) the partnership might identify the geographic area or target population served by a project; (3) process criteria involved the implementation of the project and included project initiation, the structure and management of partnership operations, and resource acquisition; (4) understanding how a project was implemented could reveal important information about the success or failure of a project, and ways in which programs could be improved; (5) outcome criteria related to the effects of a given project, including such tangible effects as the number of housing units built or commercial space developed, and less tangible effects, such as changes in the environment or community; (6) there was no federal program with the direct objective of supporting public-private housing and community development partnerships; (7) the framework should serve as a guide to evaluating the need for and the implementation and outcome of housing and community development projects undertaken by public-private partnerships; (8) setting forth evaluation criteria implies the need for measuring performance against those criteria; and (9) the framework could serve as a planning tool for federal, state, or local officials and private-sector participants in public-private partnerships.