/ D \ Brownfields 1996 Assessment Pilot Fact Sheet

\ J East St. Louis, IL

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 Region 5 selected the Metro-East St. Louis
community governments for a Regional Brownfields
Pilot. The communities include Alorton, Centreville, and
East St. Louis, with a combined population of over
50,000. The region was an industrial and transportation
center that began to decline starting in the 1930's due to a
number of factors, including high crime, low
productivity, flood plain constraints, poor public image,
deterioration of industrial facilities, and changes in waste
disposal regulation. Intercommunity competition,
deterioration of the existing industrial infrastructure, and
a long-term pattern of neglect has constrained
development in the area.

Pilot Snapshot

Date of Announcement: 09/01/1996
Amount: $200,000

Profile: The Pilot targets the 220-acre former Alcoa
Aluminum site that is located in a predominantly
minority community in the metro area.

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 5 Brownfields Team
(312)886-7576

EPA Region 5 Brownfields Web site
(http://www.epa.gov/R5Brownfields)

Grant Recipient: East St. Louis, IL, City of
(618)482-6634

Objectives

East St. Louis has initiated reindustrialization of a
former Alcoa Aluminum site on 220 acres in a
predominantly minority community in the metro area.
The focus of the East St. Louis Pilot is on developing a
sustainable secondary materials manufacturing district
on the former Alcoa site. The site is in an economically
depressed area, which has a 90% minority population, a
24% unemployment rate, and a loss of 10,000 jobs in
the last three decades. The Pilot will develop and test
innovative remediation technologies for the clean-up of
the Alcoa site, recovering gypsum and red-clay tailings
for reuse if possible.

The East St. Louis Pilot, called the Metro East
Initiative, will develop a geographic information system
(GIS) to locate other contaminated sites in the area and
assist in on-site remediation projects and in measuring
environmental and fiscal impacts of brownfields
redevelopment. The EPA grant will be used for an
Advisory Committee, title searches and research, GIS

United States	c

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Protection Agency	Response (5105T)	MaV97

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creation, GIS analysis, transaction screening of sites,
and reports and presentations.

Activities

The Pilot is:

•	Evaluating technical, legal, and financial risks
associated with effective reuse of the Alcoa
Aluminum site;

•	Implementing and adapting a GIS database to
inventory brownfields in the metro area;

•	Developing a community neighborhood outreach
program;

•	Creating a market-based index of available,
brownfields sites for prospective employers; and

•	Conducting a base-line analysis to determine
availability of secondary resource materials
manufacturing in the metropolitan region.

Experience with the East St. Louis Pilot has been a
catalyst for related activities including the funding.

•	East St. Louis is working with the Economic
Development Administration (EDA) about
infrastructure grants for the redevelopment of the
Alcoa Aluminum site.

•	East St. Louis continues to coordinate technical
and financial resources from EPA, EDA, and the
Department of Housing and Urban Development
to target brownfields redevelopment in the metro
area.

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-97-054
May 97

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