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Additionally, food insecurity rates, which are higher among lower -income households <br />and households of color, doubled among all households and tripled among households with <br />children during the onset of COVID-19 from February 2020 to May 2020.200 Improving healthy <br />food access supports public health, particularly among lower -income households and households <br />of color that face disproportionate outcomes. <br />Treasury Response: Treasury recognizes the connection between neighborhood built <br />environment and physical health outcomes as discussed in the research and analysis provided by <br />commenters, including risk factors that may have contributed to disproportionate COVID-19 <br />health impacts in low-income communities. The final rule also recognizes that the public health <br />impacts of the pandemic are broader than just the COVID-19 disease itself and include <br />substantial impacts on mental health and public safety challenges like rates of violent crime, <br />which are correlated with a neighborhood's built environment and features. As such, <br />neighborhood features that promote improved health and safety outcomes respond to the pre- <br />existing disparities that contributed to COVID-19's disproportionate impacts on low-income <br />communities. <br />The final rule includes enumerated eligible uses in disproportionately impacted <br />communities for developing neighborhood features that promote improved health and safety <br />outcomes, such as parks, green spaces, recreational facilities, sidewalks, pedestrian safety <br />features like crosswalks,201 projects that increase access to healthy foods, streetlights, <br />Zoo Caroline George and Adie Tomer, Beyond 'food deserts': America needs a new approach to mapping food, <br />Brookings Institution (August 17, 2021), https://www.brookings.edu/research/beyond-food-deserts-america-needs-a- <br />new-approach-to-mapping-food-insecurity/. <br />2°1 However, Treasury cautions recipients that general infrastructure development, including street or road <br />construction, remains a generally ineligible use of funds under the final rule. Sidewalks and pedestrian safety should <br />be the predominant component of uses of funds in this category. While projects may include ancillary construction <br />needed to execute the predominant component, a project that predominantly involves street construction or repair to <br />benefit vehicular traffic would be ineligible. <br />132 <br />