ŁEPA United States Environmental Protection Agency Washington, DC. 20460 Solid Waste and Emergency Response (5105) EPA 500-F-00-251 November 2000 www.epa.gov/brownfields/ Outreach and Special Projects Staff (5105) Brownfields Success Stories Glen Cove Showcases Waterfront Redevelopment Success ith the help of an EPA Brownfields Assessment Pilot and a Showcase Community grant, Glen Cove, New York, recently cel- ebrated the cleanup and redevelopment of one of eight brownfield sites that are part of the city's Glen Cove Creek Waterfront Revital- ization Project. This former commercial and industrial property is now home to an environmental consulting firm. To date, the Pilot has helped the city leverage approximately $20 million in grants and technical assistance from various governmental entities. In addition, private development has invested in a number of properties along the waterfront. The city's overall Revitalization Project expects to generate approximately $200 million in annual sales and $10 million in taxes, as well as create more than 1,700 new full-time jobs. With this first brownfields redevelopment project complete, Glen Cove resi- dents will soon enjoy new economic stability and new jobs through the continued development of the waterfront district. The City of Glen Cove was once considered the center of the fabled "Gold Coast" and home to many influential and wealthy New York families. However, Glen Cove Creek, a 1.1-mile federal navigation channel close to downtown, has been the industrial hub of the city since the mid-1600s. As a result of this history, the area is blanketed with more than 50 acres of federal and state Superfund sites and 146 cont. JUST THE FACTS: • Leveraged $20 million in grants and technical assistance to support the Waterfront Revitalization Project. • Assessed a former printing facility and determined that cleanup was not warranted. • Celebrated the opening of a former brownfield redeveloped as an environmental consulting firm. "By recycling and reusing, we take the pressure off the greenfields." —Glen Cove Mayor, Thomas Suozzi ERA'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. EPA is funding: assessment demonstration pilot programs (each funded up to $200,000 over two years), to assess brownfields sites and to test cleanup and redevelopment models; job training pilot programs (each funded up to $200,000 over two years), to provide training for residents of communities affected by brownfields to facilitate cleanup of brownfields sites and prepare trainees for future employment in the environmental field; and, cleanup revolving loan fund programs (each funded up to $500,000 over five years) to capitalize loan funds to make loans for the environmental cleanup of brownfields. These pilot programs 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. ------- acres of brownfields. These properties, with their unknown degrees of contamination, have discouraged new businesses and negatively impacted the city's overall economy, property values, and tax base. Glen Cove's revitalization area has been designated an urban blight area and is located within a Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) low-income census tract. Thirteen percent of households within a one-mile radius of the district's center have an annual income of less than $15,000. CONTACTS: In response to these problems, the city initiated a Revitalization Project to promote sustainable development in the waterfront district. Expected to create as many as 1,700 new full-time jobs, the project will also bring in new businesses that will generate an estimated $200 million in annual sales and $10 million in taxes. To support the city's Revitalization Project, EPA awarded Glen Cove a Brownfields Assessment Pilot grant of $50,000 in 1997. Pilot funding was supplemented by a $200,000 EPA Showcase Community grant in 1998. Glen Cove Community Development Agency (516)676-1625 U.S. EPA Region 2 (212)637-4314 Visit the EPA Brownfields web site at: http://www.epa.gov/brownfields/ The one-acre Northern Type site is the first of the targeted brownfields to be redeveloped. Like most of the local brownfields, the Northern Type property has a long history of commercial and industrial uses, including a storage area for a lumber yard, a garage and auto repair shop, and most recently, a printing facility. Although the site was suspected to be contaminated, assessments completed by the Pilot in June 1998 determined that existing conditions did not warrant environ- mental cleanup. Based on these findings, an environmental consulting group agreed to purchase the property. Additionally, the firm funded a $250,000 renovation of the existing warehouse into an office building. In March of 2000, several employees of the firm relocated from the corporate office in Manhattan to the new office in Glen Cove. The firm now plans to expand the Glen Cove office and hire additional employees from the surrounding community. The Pilot plans to continue its efforts by funding assessments at each of the remaining targeted brownfields properties. In addition to the funds leveraged from the firm, the Pilot helped the city leverage more than $20 million in additional funding and technical support to support the Waterfront Revitalization Project. This leveraged funding includes a $4 million grant from the New York State Clean Water/Clean Air Bond Act for assessment and cleanup; a $9 million grant from the Depart- ment of Transportation (DOT) for road construction to improve access to the waterfront; a $6 million Section 108 loan and a $500,000 Brownfields Economic Development Grant from HUD to assist in the acquisition and cleanup of privately held brownfields; a $500,000 grant from New York State Department of Environmental Conservation for creek improvements; a $580,000 Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act grant to fund the construction of a biofiltration system to protect the creek from upstream contamination; and a $2 million grant from DOT TEA-21 pro- gram for a pedestrian walkway along the creek. At the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the new consulting group's building on April 17,2000, Glen Cove's mayor, Thomas Suozzi, addressed the importance of redeveloping brownfields sites. The Mayor stated that "[w]e can clean them up, reinstate them as economic generators, and by recy- cling and reusing, we take the pressure off the greenfields." For more information on the Glen Cove Brownfields Pilot, contact EPA Region 2 at (212) 637-4314. Brownfields Success Story November 2000 Glen Cove, New York EPA 500-F-00-251 ------- |