EPA Invests $1.4 Million to Help Redevelop Abandoned Sites in Western Pennsylvania (PA)
PHILADELPHIA (June 6, 2010)
-- The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
announced $1.4 million in new investments to assess numerous
abandoned properties in Western Pennsylvania communities slated for
redevelopment. EPA’s brownfields grants will help the North
Side Industrial Development Company in Pittsburgh and the
Washington County Redevelopment Authority transform vacant and
contaminated lands into environmentally and economically- viable
places.
“Brownfields initiatives demonstrate how
environmental protection and economic development work
hand-in-hand,” said Shawn M. Garvin, regional administrator
for EPA’s mid-Atlantic region. “Along with generating
jobs, these grants will help southwestern Pennsylvania communities
convert vacant industrial properties into assets for the community,
the environment, and the economy.”
The North Side Industrial Development Company,
which serves Allegheny and Westmoreland Counties, will receive two
grants totaling $1 million that will be used to assess abandoned
industrial sites in multiple communities along the Ohio and
Allegheny Rivers in and around Pittsburgh. The assessments are
expected to facilitate the redevelopment of brownfields into
advanced manufacturing facilities for new technologies such as
robotics, medical devices, and precision instruments.
The Washington County Redevelopment Authority
will receive two grants totaling $400,000 to assess Washington
County properties that once thrived as an industrial and coal
mining center. Plant closings have resulted in significant job
losses that left behind hundreds of acres of vacant and underused
contaminated lands. There are 136 brownfields sites in the county,
the majority of which are former industrial facilities and
mine-scarred lands. The brownfields assessments are expected to
facilitate the county’s comprehensive cleanup and sustainable
redevelopment plan to transform sites into community parks, reuse
existing buildings, and incorporate green building
techniques.
EPA’s brownfields program encourages
redevelopment of America’s estimated 450,000 abandoned and
contaminated waste sites. Brownfield grants help to assess, clean
and redevelop abandoned, contaminated properties known as
brownfields. Brownfields are sites where expansion, redevelopment,
or reuse may be complicated by the presence or potential presence
of a hazardous substance, pollutant, or contaminant. Grant
recipients are selected through a national
competition.
Since the beginning of the program in 1995, EPA
has investeed 1,895 assessment grants totaling over $447.6 million,
279 revolving loan fund grants totaling more than $273.1 million,
and 752 cleanup grants totaling $140.8 million.
Additional information on the EPA brownfields
program is available at https://www.epa.gov/brownfields . Additional information on grant recipients is
available at https://www.epa.gov/brownfieldsgrant_info/index.htm
.
