[2] As HUD Secretary, Cisneros was credited with initiating the revitalization of many public housing developments and with formulating policies that contributed to achieving the nation's highest ever rate of home ownership.

After public office, Cisneros served as President and COO for the Spanish-language network Univision from 1997 to 2000 before forming American City Vista to work the nation's leading homebuilders to create homes priced within the range of average families.

His mother was the daughter of Rómulo Munguía, a relatively wealthy and well connected Mexican printer and intellectual,[10] and Carolina Malpica Munguía, an educator, radio host, and community activist, who chose to leave Mexico in 1926 after the leftist Mexican Revolution and Cristero War[11][12] Cisneros's father, who came from a family of small farmers who had settled in Colorado after losing their Spanish land grant during the Great Depression[13] was a federal civil servant and later an Army colonel who met Elvira Munguia while he was stationed in San Antonio.

In 1971, the year his eldest daughter Teresa Angelica was born, Cisneros was honored as a White House Fellow and served as an assistant to the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare, Elliot Richardson.

When Cisneros arrived back home, he discovered the old order, stagnant political arena in San Antonio was falling apart and now experiencing a growing socio-ethnic discontent.

[22] Since the 1950s, the Anglo-dominated Good Government League (GGL) had run the city where council members were elected at large and the majority came from wealthy ZIP codes in the Anglo populated north side.

[23][24] The Mexican American community believed they had been neglected for too long by a government who paid more attention to city growth in their own residential area than grievances about drainage and infrastructure in lower-valued real estate.

He set himself on a plan to know all he could about life in the city firsthand by emptying garbage cans to learn the problems of the sanitation department, walking a beat with a police officer and administering first aid with ambulance attendants.

During the civil-rights furor of the 1960s, the Voting Rights Act signed into law in 1965 required that racial groups be given direct representation by political districts to assure the election of a member.

In 1982, he was selected as one of the "Ten Outstanding Young Men of America" by the U.S. Jaycees, in addition to receiving a prestigious Jefferson Award for "Greatest Public Service by an Individual 35 Years or Under.

[citation needed] U.S. News & World Report listed him (along with then-Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton) as one of "Ten Rising Stars of American Politics", and a 60 Minutes profile introduced him to a televised national audience.

The publication pointed to such achievements as a downtown riverfront redevelopment that drew tourists from far and wide and contending that he had "changed San Antonio's image from a poor and somewhat sleepy town to a culturally and economically vibrant model for the future of urban America."

The national visibility Cisneros gained as mayor of San Antonio led to President Ronald Reagan appointing him in 1983 to the Bipartisan Commission on Central America, chaired by Henry Kissinger.

In Señor Alcalde ("Mr. Mayor"), John Gillies wrote: "He tried to avoid a political label, such as Democrat or Republican, because he wanted to consider the needs of all of San Antonio's groupings....

[citation needed] A 1993 survey of historians, political scientists and urban experts conducted by Melvin G. Holli of the University of Illinois at Chicago saw Cisneros ranked as the twelfth-best American big-city mayor to serve between the years 1820 and 1993.

Judith Evans reported in The Washington Post that both critics and supporters of Cisneros said he never lacked passion for his job and that he was able to make changes at the margin that made HUD a more effective housing provider.

Bruce Katz, vice president and founding director of the Metropolitan Policy Program at the Brookings Institution, said at a July 14, 2009, event there that HOPE VI is generally considered to be one of the most successful urban regeneration initiatives in the past half century.

HOPE VI was not without controversy, and Cisneros even appeared on Montel Williams' talk show to discuss HUD's plan to raze America's most crime-ridden, dilapidated housing projects and replace them with attractive new homes with modern amenities in mixed-use developments.

Near the end of his tenure as Secretary, Cisneros told The Washington Post that he was most proud of his effort to reform public housing, changing the way local officials provide shelter to the country's poor.

However, the agency's ability to convince lenders, builders and real estate agents that there was money to be made in selling housing to low- and moderate-income individuals played a significant role, he said.

However, in the August 5, 2008 issue of The Village Voice, Wayne Barrett argued that Andrew Cuomo made a series of decisions as Secretary of HUD between 1997 and 2001 that helped give birth to the country's current housing credit crisis.

Deborah Austin, director of legislation and policy for the National Low Income Housing Coalition, said in 1996, "For all we may not have liked about Cisneros, he was largely responsible for beating back pressure to eliminate and substantially reduce the department."

He unveiled a plan for HUD to provide $70 million in housing vouchers enabling low-income Americans to rent living space in the communities of their choice, an idea that brought Cisneros criticism in affluent circles in his native Texas and elsewhere.

Cisneros decided to stay in his position, adding in a statement in the San Antonio Express-News, "I regret any mistakes that I have made but affirm once again that I have at no point violated the public's trust.

"[citation needed] He said the decision was largely brought on by the mounting legal costs to defend an investigation by special prosecutor David Barrett into allegations he had lied to the FBI about the size of payments he gave his former mistress, Linda Medlar.

"[citation needed] Medlar had surfaced in 1994 with a breach of contract lawsuit against Cisneros, claiming he had agreed to support her until her daughter's college graduation, but that he had discontinued monthly payments.

Cisneros has also been author, editor or collaborator in several books, including Interwoven Destinies: Cities and the Nation, a project with the late former HUD Secretary Jack Kemp; Opportunity and Progress: A Bipartisan Platform for National Housing Policy was presented the Common Purpose Award for demonstrating the potential of bipartisan cooperation; and Casa y Comunidad: Latino Home and Neighborhood Design, a publication that took the first-ever look at the growing and increasingly prosperous U.S. Latino community and its housing needs, was awarded the Benjamin Franklin Silver Medal in the category of best business book of 2006.

In his 1993 book, Interwoven Destinies, Cisneros wrote, "The strength of the nation's economy, the contact points for international economics, the health of our democracy, and the vitality of our humanistic endeavors — all are dependent on whether America's cities work."

Cisneros said Hispanic immigrants must invest in American society by mastering English, putting their children through school, buying homes, providing their families with health care, and participating enthusiastically in civic, community and religious activities.

In 2009, he created the nonprofit group, Our Pledge, to help immigrants integrate into American society by improving language skills and expanding their participation in military service and civic activities.