Better idea : scrap the HUD “block grants”. Legislatively eliminate them. If there’s no federal money, then the feds have no power to impose rules for places to qualify for federal money.
Similarly, scrap federal transportation grants, and lower federal gasoline tax accordingly. No federal money = no federal rule making.
De-fund the federal departments and lay off the people while you’re at it.
The problem continues through to the local municipalities that accept HUD block grants which puts them squarely in the Fed's "authority" to tell them what to do.
Don't take the money = Federal Bureaucrats can't tell a municipality what to do.
Local bureaucrats in the beautiful area that I live in wanted to take the money, it was fought tooth and nail with same bureaucrats getting dumped from office at election time.
That's exactly how it should be. Local control by an informed electorate keeps the overarching federal bureaucrats from telling us what to do.
We have a beautiful Central Park downtown with a canal that comes from river water running through it. The park was full of homeless and transients. I believe the city got a block grant to build because they came up with grand plans to build beautiful housing around this park. They advertised it as the beginning of a perfect neighborhood with shops moving in, etc. Anyway, they finally finished it. It was gorgeous in a gorgeous setting. About a year later I drove through. Graffiti on the buildings and trash cans. I looked around and the populace was black. They’ve had a couple of shootings there.
The point is you can build them beautiful places to live and it just doesn’t matter. They turn it to crap.