IN
THIS ISSUE:
States,
Tribes Share Record $75.4 Million in Brownfields Grants
Communities in 42 states and Puerto Rico will share more
than $75 million in EPA brownfields grants to help revitalize
former industrial and commercial sites, turning them from
problem properties to productive community uses. The grants
were announced recently by EPA Administrator Mike Leavitt.
“Brownfields sites like this are a blight on thousands
of cities, towns, and rural areas across the country,” Leavitt
said. “We’re helping turn these eyesores into
opportunities, bringing new life to communities and cities,
everything from new jobs and new housing to new shopping
opportunities and new recreational facilities.”
In all, 219 applicants, including five tribal nations,
were selected to receive 265 grants. The $75.4 million will
provide:
- 155 assessment grants totaling $37.6 million to be used
to conduct planning for eventual cleanup at one or more
brownfield sites, or as part of a community-wide effort.
- 92 cleanup grants totaling $16.9 million to provide
funding for grant recipients to carry out cleanup activities
at brownfield sites they own.
- 18 revolving loan fund grants totaling $20.9 million
to provide funding for communities to capitalize a revolving
loan fund and to provide subgrants to carry out cleanup
activities at brownfields sites. Revolving loan funds are
generally used to provide low or zero interest loans for
brownfields cleanups.
Earlier this year, 16 communities received job training
grants totaling $2.47 million to teach environmental cleanup
job skills to over 1,000 individuals living in low-income
areas near brownfields sites. To date, more than 60 percent
of people completing brownfields training programs have obtained
employment in the environmental field.
In addition to industrial and commercial redevelopment,
brownfields approaches have included the conversion of industrial
waterfronts to riverfront parks, landfills to golf courses,
and rail corridors to recreational trails. EPA’s brownfields
assistance has leveraged more than $5.8 billion in private
investment, helped create more than 27,000 jobs, and resulted
in the assessment of more than 4,500 properties.
For more information, visit http://www.epa.gov/brownfields/archive/pilot_arch.htm
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Historic Trolley Barn Site Will House
the Kentucky Center for African American Heritage
Once the vibrant heart of the African American community
in the city of Louisville, KY, the Russell neighborhood will
soon be home to a museum and cultural center highlighting
and honoring the contributions of African Americans to the
city’s and state’s history. The Kentucky Center
for African American Heritage will be established in the
city’s historic trolley barn complex. The trolley barn
was used for transportation-related purposes beginning in
1879 when it housed mule-drawn trolleys. Later, mechanized
trolleys were serviced there.
The two-acre trolley barn site lies within one of Louisville’s
old industrial corridors – an area containing numerous
abandoned and underutilized properties. Based on an earlier
environmental assessment resulting in a $30 million cleanup
estimate, the stigma of contamination at the site discouraged
any redevelopment interests. To help address the barriers
to redevelopment in this area, EPA awarded the city a $200,000
Brownfields Pilot Assessment Grant in September 1995.
With this funding, the city targeted the trolley barn site
for a new environmental assessment. Based on the new assessment,
the city was able to move forward with soil cleanup at a
cost of $80,000, while remaining fully protective of the
health and safety of local residents. Additional costs were
incurred for lead abatement and building stabilization.
Now on its way to becoming home to the Kentucky Center
for African American Heritage, the 4,000 sq. ft. main trolley
barn features an elegant clerestory and will house the primary
exhibit hall. Exhibits in the museum will tell the stories
of African Americans in Kentucky from the pioneer days through
the civil rights movement, including such well-known figures
as York, a slave who made a significant contribution to the
Lewis and Clark Expedition.
Groundbreaking for the heritage center took place in February
2003, and it will open to the public early in 2005.
To learn more about this project, visit http://www.epa.gov/brownfields/success/louisville.pdf.
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Old Mills Become New Condos in New Market, NH When
Ebenezer Smith operated grist and saw mills on the banks
of the Lamprey River in Newmarket, NH in the early 19th century,
he had no idea that he was the beginning of a 150-year tradition
of industry on the site. The downtown mills represented the
heart and vitality of the community for well over a century.
However, when manufacturing industries migrated out of
New England in the late 20th century, what remained on the
banks of the Lamprey River was an eyesore and a burden to
the community – a polluted and unused brownfield site.
With cooperation between private corporations, investors,
town, state, and federal governments, the industrial days
of the site were put cleanly behind it.
In 1988, when United Technologies Corporation (UTC) sold
the industrial complex to the Essex Group, Inc., they agreed
to indemnify the new owner for costs associated with onsite
environmental contamination. Environmental investigations
conducted by UTC revealed petroleum contamination and cleanup
began by the mid-90s. By the spring of 1998, the town of
Newmarket negotiated an agreement with the Essex Group and
the old mill space was transferred to the Newmarket Community
Development Corporation (NCDC) for redevelopment as residential
housing. Approximately $25,000 of Targeted Brownfield Assessment
money from the EPA was used to perform further site assessment
activities, which revealed that a manufactured gas plant
(MGP), a coal gasification plant used to produce gas for
lighting the mill, once operated on the site. Additional
contaminants related to the MGP found in both soil and groundwater
were voluntarily remediated by UTC.
The first phase of the project, completed in 2002, created
36 condominium units that sold at market values ranging from
$200,000 to $425,000. As of spring 2004, the new condos are
expected to generate between $200,000 and $300,000 annually
in property taxes for the town. Future phases of development
at the site may result in office space or other mixed-use
occupants.
Cooperation between public and private partners to complete
the reclamation of the Essex Mills property has proven to
be a model of successful brownfields redevelopment for the
town of Newmarket, NH.
To view photographs of the site, visit http://www.epa.gov/newengland/brownfields/success/newmarket_tba.htm
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Polluted
Dirt Makes Way for Park on Belltown Waterfront
By Lisa
Stiffler, Seattle Post-Intelligencer Reporter
The welcomed transformation of a petroleum-soaked vacant
lot into an outdoor sculpture park on Belltown’s waterfront
finally started. About three years behind schedule, dump
trucks full of clean dirt began spilling their loads at the
site, which for more than 70 years was home to a Unocal fuel
terminal. The Seattle Art Museum’s $85 million Olympic
Sculpture Park is now pegged for completion in spring 2006.
To restore the heavily polluted land, thousands of tons
of polluted soil were excavated and hauled away, starting
in 1989. Millions of gallons of contaminated groundwater
have been captured and treated. And now, almost enough dirt
to fill Smith Tower is being spread across the 8.5-acre property,
burying the remaining contamination beneath a thick layer
of clean soil. The dirt is being “recycled” from
a construction project at the museum’s downtown location.
More soil will be added in a later phase of the project,
resulting in a clean cap up to 29 feet deep.
The project is “something very unusual and something
very special,” said Larry Altose, spokesman for the
state Ecology Department, which provided $2.5 million in
grants to help fund the final stages of the cleanup. “The
way the Seattle Art Museum is redeveloping the old Unocal
site is something you don’t often get to see,” he
said. “Contaminated land turns literally into a work
of art.”
Unocal excavated polluted dirt before selling the property
to the museum in 1999, and still operates a groundwater cleaning
system at the site. Since the early 1900s, the property was
home to numerous oil tanks and pipelines above and below
ground. There were loading areas for railcars and trucks,
and a tanker loading dock. In places, there is still soil
contamination with dangerous levels of petroleum products
that is too difficult to remove.
Delays in developing the park were caused primarily by
uncertainty over plans for rebuilding the Alaskan Way Viaduct,
said Chris Rogers, the museum’s capital projects director.
At one point, there was discussion of running the viaduct
in a tunnel under the park, but that plan has been scrapped.
For entire story, see http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/179474_sculpture25.html
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South Carolina Community Rallies Around Brownfields Site The town of Cowpens, SC (pop. 2,000) was faced with the
loss of more than 400 jobs, and an abandoned building when
Cowpens’ largest employer, a clothing manufacturing
plant, closed in 1990. Purchasing the site in 1981, the clothing
manufacturer secured an agreement between the county and
the manufacturer’s parent company, to guarantee $10
million in industrial revenue bonds. Circumstances led to
the plant’s closing and the clothing manufacturer defaulting
on the bonds, thus leaving the county holding title to the
abandoned property.
Inside the dormant facility, town officials discovered
85 drums of industrial chemicals with no responsible party
to pay for cleanup. Operations at the plant had also contaminated
the site’s groundwater. Potential liability fears prevented
developers from buying and making any attempts to cleanup
the site. In May 1997, EPA awarded Cowpens a $200,000 Brownfields
Assessment Pilot Grant - one of the first small communities
in the country to win such an award.
Focusing their efforts on site revitalization, Cowpens
leveraged more than $225,000 worth of time and services from
local businesses - free of charge to the town. The University
of South Carolina at Columbia provided funding for technical
services related to the design and development of a proposed
industrial park. A Baseline Economics Study and a Retail
Business Survey were provided free of charge by the University
of South Carolina and Clemson University, respectively.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers conducted a groundwater
sampling investigation on the site and in the surrounding
community. EPA Region 4 committed $2,300 toward a landscape
design for future redevelopment and $6,000 toward emergency
response ground studies and electromagnetic surveying.
By seeking out sponsors interested in providing services
free of charge, the town directed more of the brownfields
grant money toward complex soil and groundwater investigations
at the site. Leveraging cost estimates and future development
plans were critical to the formation of the Cowpens Development
Corporation and their taking title to the property.
The town is hoping that its successful approach to the
former manufacturing site will serve as a model for brownfields
redevelopment in small communities across the country.
To learn more details about this project, visit http://www.epa.gov/brownfields/success/cowpens_sc.pdf
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