United States
Environmental
Protection Agency
Washington, D.C. 20460
Solid Waste
and Emergency
Response (5101)
EPA 500-F-97-024
May 1997
National Brownfields
Assessment Pilot
Newark, NJ
Outreach and Special Projects Staff (5101)
Quick Reference Fact Sheet
EPA's Brownfields Economic Redevelopment Initiative is designed to empower States, communities, and other
stakeholders in economic redevelopment to work together in a timely manner to prevent, assess, safely clean up, and
sustainably reuse brownfields. A brownfield is a site, or portion thereof, that has actual or perceived contamination and
an active potential for redevelopment or reuse. Between 1995 and 1996, EPA funded 76 National and Regional Brownfields
Assessment Pilots, at up to $200,000 each, to support creative two-year explorations and demonstrations of brownfields
solutions. EPAis funding morethan 27 Pilots in 1997. The Pilots are intended to provide EPA, States, Tribes, municipalities,
and communities with useful information and strategies as they continue to seek new methods to promote a unified
approach to site assessment, environmental cleanup, and redevelopment.
BACKGROUND
EPA selected the City of Newark for a Brownfields
Pilot. Industrial decline, disinvestment, and
suburbanization of northern New Jersey after World
War II have left Newark (population 275,000,
New Jersey's largest city) with more than 700
acres of largely abandoned and under-used public
and private property. These properties are known
or suspected to be contaminated from industrial
operations and manufacturing. As a result,
brownfields hamper the City's ability to attract
new investment and retain existing businesses.
Newark's industrial past has left a legacy of
unhealthy neighborhoods with degraded
environments. During the 1980s, the City lost
60,000 residents, and 26 percent of the remaining
residents are at or below the poverty level. Newark
has been designated a Federal Enterprise
Community and an Urban Enterprise Zone.
OBJECTIVES
The focus of the City's brownfields efforts is to
return abandoned sites to productive use, generate
tax revenue, and increase space available for
business expansion and new jobs. Newark intends
to integrate and use New Jersey's innovative
legislative and regulatory tools designed to
PILOT SNAPSHOT
Date of Award:
September 1996
Amount: $200,00
Site Profile: The Pilot
targets four diverse
industrial operation and
manufacturing sites.
Newark, New Jersey
Contacts:
Joel Freiser
Newark Economic
Development Corporation
(201)643-2790
Larry D'Andrea
U.S. EPA-Region 2
(212)637-4314
dandrea.larry@
epamail.epa.gov
Visit the EPA Brownfields Website at:
http://www.epa.gov/brownfields
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streamline brownfields cleanup and redevelopment
efforts. In addition, the City wants to produce a
pipeline of clean, redeveloped sites while inventing a
model expedited process replicable in other cities.
ACCOMPLISHMENTS AND ACTIVITIES
The Pilot is:
• Completing a comprehensive geographic
information system (GlS)-based brownfields
inventory;
• Assessing four diverse sites (140 Thomas Street,
Albert Steel Drum/Prentiss Drug and Pierson Creek,
Pitt/Consol Dupont, and White Chemical sites) and
readying them for remediation and development
and continuing outreach to the community through
the Newark Brownfields Working Group;
• Encouraging private investment by making
information on the assessment and cleanup of each
site available to potential investors;
• Linkingthe assessmentandredevelopmentplanning
of demonstration sites to the revitalization of their
surrounding neighborhoods; and
• Producing and updating a brownfields redevelop-
ment plan and program.
LEVERAGING OTHER ACTIVITIES
Experience with the Newark Pilot has been a catalyst
for related activities including the following.
• Applying innovative site assessment technologies
in cooperation with the New Jersey Institute of
Technology and Rutgers University.
National Brownfields Assessment Pilot Newark, New Jersey
May 1997 EPA 500-F-97-024
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