Perspectives from the Regional Administrator
Ready
for Reuse |
EPA awards New Orleans $1 million for community cleanup projects
“The brownfields program is the bedrock of EPA efforts to cleanup and reuse the nation’s contaminated properties,” said EPA Regional Administrator Richard E. Greene. “With these brownfields grants, Louisiana is helping pave the way toward cleaner communities and better lives.” Brownfields are vacant, abandoned, or under-used properties where redevelopment may be complicated by the presence or potential presence of environmental contamination. In addition to the New Orleans grant, EPA also awarded a $200,000 brownfields cleanup grant to the Progressive Church in Marrero. The church is completing cleanup of a 20-acre site that it plans to redevelop into a Family Life Center, school, day care facility, and affordable housing center for seniors. Since the beginning of the program in 1995, EPA Region 6 has provided more than $11 million for Louisiana brownfields projects. EPA’s brownfields program encourages redevelopment of America's estimated 450,000 abandoned and contaminated waste sites. Nationally, brownfields assistance has leveraged more than $9.8 billion in cleanup and redevelopment, helped create more than 43,900 jobs and resulted in the assessment of more than 11,500 properties and the cleanup of 180 properties.
This year’s Earth Day celebration at Victory Park in Dallas was a special one for EPA and its state, local, and private sector partners in this award-winning redevelopment effort.
Heifer Ready for Reuse
U.S. EPA Regional Administrator Richard E. Greene and Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality Director Marcus C. Devine presented the Ready for Reuse certification to Heifer President and Chief Executive Officer Jo Luck. "Restoring contaminated and underused properties to productive, valued parts of their communities is at the heart of EPA's land revitalization programs," Greene said. "Arkansas is an enthusiastic leader in redevelopment programs."
The 28-acre tract includes land formerly owned by a railroad and two trucking companies. Heifer, with the help of contractors and Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality, completed a cleanup of hazardous waste contamination at the rail yard and trucking terminal. Arkansas and EPA agree that Heifer Project has successfully completed cleanup of the property. The ready for reuse determination verifies that environmental conditions on this site are protective of human health and the environment based on its current use and anticipated future use as Heifer's headquarters and global village education complex. Greene said, "Renewing this property as the headquarters of such a prestigious world humanitarian organization is the perfect conclusion to the cleanup process." Initial agreement reached on sale of the cleaned-up Tex Tin Superfund Site
The developers' plans for the property include warehouse
distribution, freight forwarding, container repacking and storage
facilities, and a full-service truck stop. Dallas-based EPA Regional Administrator Richard E. Greene, in expressing his agency's enthusiasm for the Tex Tin outcome, commented "This is what the EPA's 'Ready for Re-use program is all about-bringing an underused waste site back into productive use. I am delighted that buyers have come forward to develop the Tex Tin property, closing the loop on years of effort by people at every level of government. I look forward to visiting this site in the future, when it is a vital and productive part of the Texas City economy." John Bredthauer pointed out that the city's redevelopment committee-funded by an EPA grant to Texas City and guided by Doug Hoover, the city's director of management services-has played a vital role in structuring the potential future of the Tex Tin property. "The result now", Bredthauer said, "is that, unlike numerous fenced-in environmental Superfund sites, we have a property that can once again contribute to the economy of the area, providing jobs and adding tax revenues to local government." The property transaction is expected to close within four months, and upon closing the buyers will begin infrastructure and building designs and tenant negotiations, with the build-out to coincide with the needs of the new terminal container port, which is planned for a late 2006 start-up. |