Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced $2,500,000 from President Biden’s Investing in America Agenda to expedite the assessment and cleanup of brownfield sites in Tennessee while advancing environmental justice.

EPA selected three communities in Tennessee to receive grants totaling more than $2,500,00 in competitive EPA Brownfields funding through the Multipurpose, Assessment, Revolving Loan Fund, and Cleanup (MARC) Grant programs. Thanks to the historic boost from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, this is the largest ever funding awarded in the history of the EPA’s Brownfields MARC Grant programs.

These investments are part of President Biden’s Investing in America Agenda to grow the American economy from the bottom up and middle-out – from rebuilding our nation’s infrastructure, to driving over $470 billion in private sector manufacturing and clean energy investments in the United States, to creating a manufacturing and innovation boom powered by good paying jobs that don’t require a four-year degree, to building a clean-energy economy that will combat climate change and make our communities more resilient.

“We’re working across the country to revitalize what were once dangerous and polluted sites in overburdened communities into more sustainable and environmentally just places that serve as community assets. Thanks to President Biden’s historic investments in America, we’re moving further and faster than ever before to clean up contaminated sites, spur economic redevelopment, and deliver relief that so many communities have been waiting for,” said EPA Administrator Michael S. Regan. “This critical wave of investments is the largest in Brownfields history and will accelerate our work to protect the people and the planet by transforming what was once blight into might.”

"This historic investment of more than $35 million for communities across the Southeast will help address suspected contamination of urban and suburban properties that dates back to the Industrial Revolution," said EPA Region 4 Administrator Daniel Blackman. "Brownfields and other contaminated properties often are located in environmental justice communities where residents are disproportionately impacted, thus making these awards especially critical."

Many communities that are under economic stress, particularly those located in areas that have experienced long periods of disinvestment, lack the resources needed to initiate brownfield cleanup and redevelopment projects. As brownfield sites are transformed into community assets, they attract jobs, promote economic revitalization and transform communities into sustainable and environmentally just places.

Thanks to the historic $1.5 billion boost from President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, EPA’s Brownfields Program is helping more communities than ever before begin to address the economic, social, and environmental challenges caused by brownfields and stimulate economic opportunity, and environmental revitalization in historically overburdened communities.

EPA’s Brownfields Program also advances President Biden’s Justice40 Initiative to direct 40 percent of the overall benefits of certain Federal investments to disadvantaged communities. The Brownfields Program strives to meet this commitment and advance environmental justice and equity considerations into all aspects of its work. Approximately 84 percent of the MARC program applications selected to receive funding proposed to work in areas that include historically underserved communities.

Funding Breakdown:

The following organizations in Tennessee have been selected to receive EPA Brownfields funding through the Multipurpose, Assessment, Revolving Loan Fund, and Cleanup (MARC) Grant Programs:

The Economic Development Growth Engine for Memphis and Shelby County (EDGE) has been selected for a $1,000,000 Brownfields Revolving Loan Fund (RLF) Grant. The grant will be used to capitalize a revolving loan fund from which EDGE will provide three loans and two subgrants to support cleanup activities. Grant funds also will be used to market the RLF program and conduct community engagement activities. RLF activities will focus on the City of Memphis’ urban core. Priority sites include a 5.5-acre historic school for African Americans, the 15.1-acre former Wabash Screen and Door manufacturing facility, a 0.2-acre former drycleaning facility, and the Crosstown Mound property, where a pile of contaminated soil occupying over 9.6 acres was stockpiled by the state in the late 1960s.

The HBCU Community Development Action Coalition has been selected for a $500,000 Brownfields Assessment Grant. Community-wide grant funds will be used to conduct six Phase I and five Phase II environmental site assessments. Grant funds also will be used to prepare five cleanup plans and to conduct community engagement activities including the development of a Community Involvement Plan. The target area for this grant is the City of Nashville's North Nashville Neighborhood. Priority sites include the 18th Avenue Assemblage, which consists of various parcels that have industrial histories, an abandoned former coal-fired steam plant, and a 1-acre dilapidated parking lot constructed in 1979 as an engineering control.

The City of Memphis and Shelby County Community Redevelopment Agency has been selected to lead a $1,000,000 Brownfields Assessment Coalition. Grant funds will be used to conduct 22 Phase I and 15 Phase II environmental site assessments. Grant funds also will be used to create two cleanup plans and to conduct community engagement activities. Assessment activities will focus on Memphis’ Urban Core, the Jackson Avenue Corridor, the Binghampton TIF District, and areas within and adjacent to the Soulsville TIF District. Priority sites include former dry cleaners, gas stations, car washes, and warehouses among other industrial sites. Non-lead coalition members include Klondike Smokey City CDC, the Binghampton Development Corporation, and the Soulsville Foundation.

You can read more about this year’s MARC selectees, here.

Additional Background:

EPA has selected these organizations to receive funding to address and support the reuse of brownfield sites. EPA anticipates making all the awards announced today once all legal and administrative requirements are satisfied.

EPA’s Brownfields Program began in 1995 and has provided nearly $2.37 billion in Brownfield Grants to assess and clean up contaminated properties and return blighted properties to productive reuse. EPA’s investments in addressing brownfield sites have leveraged more than $36 billion in cleanup and redevelopment. Over the years, the relatively small investment of federal funding has leveraged, from both public and private sources, nearly 260,000 jobs. Communities that previously received Brownfields Grants used these resources to fund assessments and cleanups of brownfields, and successfully leverage an average of 10.6 jobs per $100,000 of EPA Brownfield Grant funds spent and $19.78 for every dollar.

The next National Brownfields Training Conference will be held on August 8-11, 2023, in Detroit, Michigan. Offered every two years, this conference is the largest gathering of stakeholders focused on cleaning up and reusing former commercial and industrial properties. EPA co-sponsors this event with the International City/County Management Association (ICMA).

For more on Brownfields Grants: https://www.epa.gov/brownfields/types-brownfields-grant-funding

For more on EPA’s Brownfields Program: https://www.epa.gov/brownfields

Original source can be found here.