The experiment continues

I have a few points to add to "The Atlanta Experiment" (31 October, page 24).

Firstly, the property the article focused on is now owned by a private partnership in which Atlanta Housing Authority is a partner, making it a public-private partnership. And secondly, it used tax credits. The gearing of public investment occurred because the property received a large allocation of low income housing tax credits, sold to equity investors for cash. Without them, the property would have been unfeasible.

It's precisely because public-private partnerships work that we are trying to introduce a similar tax credit in the UK: the housing and regeneration tax or HART credit, profiled in your 19 September issue ("The American dream", pages 40-42). We hope that the forthcoming Barker Review will endorse tax credits as the National Housing Federation has recently endorsed HART.