United States
                      Environmental
                      Protection Agency
                      Washington, D.C. 20460
  Solid Waste
  and Emergency
  Response (5105)
EPA 500-F-00-205
July 2000
www.epa.gov/brownfields/
 &EPA     Brownfields  Cleanup
                      Revolving  Loan   Fund   Pilot
                                                                 Duquesne, PA
Outreach and Special Projects Staff (5105)
                      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. 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.
BACKGROUND

The City of Duquesne is located in the Monongahela
River Valley of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.
The economy of this region is based on steel
manufacturing. Broad economic changes, including
increased international competition in the steel
industry, have led to substantial job losses and
business closures. As a result, many formerly active
industrial sites have been left underused, idle, or
vacant. The City of Duquesne has been the most
severely affected City in the Monogahela River
Valley. The City has the largest amount of abandoned
acreage in the region, with more than 300 acres of
brownfields. The population has declined to 8,500 in
1990, from a high of 20,000 in 1940. More than a
quarter of the remaining residents are at or below the
poverty level and 14.7 percent are unemployed.
Duquesne's population is one-third minority.

The expected benefits of brownfields redevelopment
in Duquesne include cleaning up environmentally
compromised sites, creating jobs and opportunities
for entrepreneurship in disadvantaged
neighborhoods, and increasing tax revenues.
Duquesne,  along with Clairton, and McKeesport,
received a Brownfields Assessment Demonstration
Pilot in 1999.
PILOT SNAPSHOT
                     Date of Announcement:
                     July 2000

                     Amount: $500,000

                     BCRLF Target Area:
                     City of Duquesne
Duquesne, PA
Contacts:

City Manager

(412)469-3770
 Region 3 BCRLF
 Coordinator
 (215)814-3246
      Visit the EPA Region 3 Brownfields web site at:
     www.epa.gov/reg3hwmd/brownfld/hmpage1.htm

For further information, including specific Pilot contacts, additional
 Pilot information, brownfields news and events, and publications
     and links, visit the EPA Brownfields web site at:
          http://www.epa.gov/brownfields

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BCRLF OBJECTIVES

The objectives of the City's brownfields program
include eliminating blight, creating jobs, increasing
the tax base, and curtailing the exploitation of
farmland and the proliferation of urban sprawl.

FUND STRUCTURE AND OPERATIONS

The Redevelopment Authority of the City of Duquesne
(RACD) will be the lead agency and serve as fund
manager. The site manager has not been designated.

Duquesne will contribute in-kind services to maximize
loan value.  The City expects to make two or three
loans  of $100,000 to  $250,000  to  prospective
landowners or developers in the three-year pilot period.
The  term of each loan will range between two and
seven years. The interest rate will be determined on a
loan-specific basis. Origination fees for the loans will
range from zero to two  percent.  Ten percent of a
project's loan value will be retained by the City until
the project has been satisfactorily completed.

BCRLF loan recipients will be required to participate in
the Pennsylvania Land Recycling Program.

LEVERAGING OTHER RESOURCES

Many of the brownfields targeted by the Duquesne
BCRLF are in state-designated Keystone Opportunity
Zones  and/or Enterprise Zones. Available tools for
brownfields redevelopment in these areas  include, tax
abatements on real estate, income tax, sales and use
taxes,  and  corporate income taxes.  Other possible
sources of funds are the existing EPA Brownfields
Assessment Demonstration Pilot grant fund, Allegheny
County and Pennsylvania Department of  Community
and Economic Development's loan and grant programs,
and local banking and lending institutions.
Use of 'BCRLF Pilot funds must be in accordance with
CERCLA, and all CERCLA restrictions on use of funding
also apply to BCRLF funds.
Brownfields Cleanup Revolving Loan Fund Pilot                                                 Duquesne, Pennsylvania
July 2000	EPA 500-F-00-205

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