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Brownfields 2000 Assessment Pilot Fact Sheet
Fort Dodge, IA
EPA Brownfields Initiative
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.
Background
EPA has selected the City of Fort Dodge for a
Brownfields Pilot. Fort Dodge is a city that has a
population of 26,000 people and serves as a regional hub
for about 100,000 people. Due to a devastated farm
economy and the closing of a few of its large employers,
the city experienced a very depressed economy in the
1970s and 1980s. Property values plummeted, and about
17 percent of the population left the city to find work in
urban areas of larger cities and states. Since the
mid-1990s, when community effort helped reverse a
decision to close down a major employer, community
pride and motivation have been high. The city has added
new industry, diversified into value-added production,
and begun a cleanup initiative.
Pilot Snapshot
Date of Announcement: 05/01/2000
Amount: $200,000
Profile: The City of Fort Dodge targets three sites
within the city, all located along waterways in the
greenbelt corridor system.
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 7 Brownfields Team
(800)223-0425
EPA Region 7 Brownfields Web site
(http://www.epa.gov/region7/cleanup/brown fields)
Grant Recipient: Fort Dodge, IA
(515) 573-8321
Objectives
The City of Fort Dodge's goal is to complete the
riverfront redevelopment project, which includes
streambank stabilization, pond restoration, development
of a footbridge, and encouragement of a private
property owner to donate its riverfront property. The
Pilot will facilitate these efforts by identifying any
contamination problems in the project area and planning
for cleanup at three targeted brownfields.
The major redevelopment focus of the city is to make its Activities
river corridor clean and safe for recreational use through
its riverfront master plan. As the first step in the
riverfront improvement plan, the Pilot will target three
brownfield sites-Volunteer Park Junkyard (12 th Avenue,
SW), Soldier Creek Dump (5 th Street), and the
Hawkeye Avenue Elevator-all located along the Des
Moines River or Soldier Creek and in the greenbelt
corridor system. In addition, the sites are located in the
city's oldest neighborhoods and are characterized as
low-income areas (e.g., 24 percent of the families live in
Activities planned as part of this Pilot include:

•	Conducting Phase I and II site investigations to
determine whether the three targeted sites pose
risks and need to be cleaned up;
•	Developing cleanup and mitigation plans at the
targeted sites; and
•	Engaging community participation in the
assessment and cleanup planning at the targeted
sites.
United States
Environmental
Protection Agency
Washington, DC 20450
Solid Waste
and Emergency
Response (5105T)
EPA 500-F-00-092
May 00

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The cooperative agreement for this Pilot has not yet
been negotiated; therefore, activities described in this
fact sheet are subject to change.
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 fact sheet are subject to change.
United States
Environmental
Protection Agency
Washington, DC 20450
and Emergency
Response (5105T)
Solid Waste
EPA 500-F-00-092
May 00

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