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Brownfields 2004 Assessment Grant Fact Sheet
Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department, WA
EPA Brownfields Program
EPA's Brownfields Program empowers states,
communities, and other stakeholders to work together to
prevent, assess, safely clean up, and sustainably reuse
brownfields. A brownfield site is real property, the
expansion, redevelopment, or reuse of which may be
complicated by the presence or potential presence of a
hazardous substance, pollutant, or contaminant. On
January 11, 2002, President George W. Bush signed into
law the Small Business Liability Relief and Brownfields
Revitalization Act. Under the Brownfields Law, EPA
provides financial assistance to eligible applicants through
four competitive grant programs: assessment grants,
revolving loan fund grants, cleanup grants, and job
training grants. Additionally, funding support is provided
to state and tribal response programs through a separate
mechanism.
Community Description
Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department was selected to
receive a brownfields assessment grant. The target area
includes all census tracts in Pierce County (population
700,820) with five or more former gas station sites.
Centered roughly in south central Tacoma, this area has a
population of 224,484. It includes about 32 percent of the
county's population and 41 percent of racial or ethnic
minorities. Unemployment in the target areas is 11.5
percent, compared to 7.6 percent in Tacoma, which has
the highest unemployment rate among eight metropolitan
Washington cities. The poverty rate in the target area is
14.8 percent, compared to the county's poverty rate of ten
percent. Seventy percent of the targeted gas station sites
are within Tacoma, which is a federally designated
Renewal Community.
Assessment Grant
$200,000 for petroleum
EPA has selected Tacoma-Pierce County Health
Department for a brownfields assessment grant.
The petroleum grant funds will be used for Phase
II environmental site assessments on five to fifteen
petroleum brownfields sites. This will help support
an advisory board to promote restoration and
redevelopment of more than 730 former gas
stations throughout Pierce County, and for
community involvement activities. A recently
completed inventory of former gas stations in
Pierce County indicates that up to 300 require
further environmental assessment.
Contacts
For further information, including specific grant
contacts, additional grant information, brownfields
news and events, and publications and links, visit
the EPA Brownfields Web site
(http://www.epa.gov/brownfields).
EPA Region 10 Brownfields Team
(206)553-7299
EPA Region 10 Brownfields Web site
(http://yosemite.epa.gov/R10/CL
EANUP.NSF/sites/bf)
Grant Recipient: Tacoma-Pierce County
Health Department, WA
Tacoma-Pierce County Environmental Health
Program
(253) 798-4784
Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department
(253) 798-4784
The information presented in this fact sheet comes
from the grant proposal; EPA cannot attest to the
accuracy of this information. The cooperative
agreement for the grant has not yet been
negotiated. Therefore, activities described in this
United States
Environmental
Protection Agency
Washington, DC 20450
Solid Waste
and Emergency
Response (5105T)
EPA 560-F-04-095
June 2004

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fact sheet are subject to change.
United States	c
Environmental	anri Fmpflpn™	EPA 560-F-04-095
Protection Agency	Response (5105T)	June 2004
Washington, DC 20450	Kesponse (si us )

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