United States
                       Environmental
                       Protection Agency
                       Washington, D.C. 20460
Solid Waste
and Emergency
Response (5101)
EPA 500-F-97-025
May 1997
                       National   Brownfields
                      Assessment  Pilot
                                                   New Orleans,  LA
  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 New Orleans for a
Brownfields Pilot. New Orleans is located at the foot
of the Chemical Corridor and has an abundance of
port, rail, and highway systems that transport high
volumes of hazardous materials. There are numerous
brownfields  throughout the City which have
significant impacts on local communities, many of
which are minority communities (over 65% of New
Orleans' population is African-American).

Prior to its induction into the Brownfields program,
New Orleans had not taken an inventory of its
brownfields or evaluated them to determine which
could be profitably redeveloped. As a result, lenders,
investors, and developers had little information with
which to decide whether to locate on brownfields in
New Orleans, forcing many to continue to choose the
surrounding  suburbs as sites for investment. The
EPA cooperative agreement will partially fund a
brownfields  inventory and ranking  project.  The
project is a critical tool in the effort to rebuild New
Orleans.

OBJECTIVES

The primary  focus of the Pilot is to develop an
inventory of brownfields in New Orleans to serve as
a blueprint for city planners, developers, and inves-
 PILOT SNAPSHOT
Contacts:

Lisa Maack
City of New Orleans
(504)565-8114
                   Date of Award:
                   September 1995

                   Amount: $200,000

                   Site Profile:  The Pilot
                   targets the creation and
                   maintenance of a
                   brownfields site inventory,
                   and the performance of
                   community outreach
New Orleans, Louisiana   activities.
  Monica Smith
  U.S. EPA-Region 6
  (214)665-6735
  smith. monica@
  epamail.epa.gov
       Visit the EPA Brownfields Website at:
       http://www.epa.gov/brownfields

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tors interested in reclaiming land for industrial or
business use. The Pilot project also seeks to improve
the environmental quality of socio-economically dis-
advantaged communities in New Orleans. The Pilot
objectives will  be realized by identifying the
brownfields, developing criteria for ranking their
economic redevelopment potential, preparing abasic
cleanup process for priority sites, and generating
redevelopment strategies.  The  City is working to
create redevelopment plans for these sites.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS AND ACTIVITIES

The Pilot has:

• Identified the City's top 10 brownfields properties
 based on economic redevelopment potential. The
 City is working to create  redevelopment plans for
 these sites;

• Developed community outreach processes which
 incorporated measures to ensure that citizens in
 affected communities will have a voice in electing a
 representative to the brownfields consortium;

• Sponsored and conducted consortium member
 meetings, comprised of lenders, developers, city
 planners, agency officials, and citizens, to  explore
 assessment and remediation funding mechanisms;
 and

• Conducted a Brownfields Site Demonstration on
 three properties within the City. The purpose of the
 demonstration was  to test new procedures and
 methodologies that will allow faster and less
 expensive  site assessments for brownfields
 properties.

The Pilot is:

• Conducting aplanning process forthe maintenance
 of an inventory, using the City'sGIS system fordata
 collection and analysis; and

• Planning to hold town meetings to ensure citizens
 have a  voice regarding future land use prior to
 redevelopment of properties.
LEVERAGING OTHER ACTIVITIES

Experience with the New Orleans Pilot has been a
catalyst for related activities including the following.

• Initiated planning for the creation  of an  EPA
 Brownfields Cleanup Revolving Loan Fund.

• A national model to speed up and reduce the cost of
 site assessments, planning and cleanup activities
 may be developed.
 National Brownfields Assessment Pilot
 May 1997
                           New Orleans, Louisiana
                              EPA 500-F-97-025

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