It had bipartisan support, reportedly because liberal legislators shared its goal of extinguishing poverty and "urban blight" and conservative legislators appreciated the control the program placed in the hands of private investors and the reduction it made in the role of the United States government. Decentralizing control over community development appealed to some Democrats because the central administration of previous programs meant benefits often did not reach the targeted low-income communities, while Republicans appreciated that the program was represented as meant to “limit the powers of the federal bureaucracy”, a political and ideological presentation reflective of “growing public resentment of big government and big bureaucracy”.