City of Gardena, CA has an interesting page regarding a Brownfield pilot project.

http://www.ci.gardena.ca.us/businesses/econdev/brownsfield.asp

Developers get $170,000 tax credit for successful brownfields project. This is a small project, but it’s always nice to hear about the success stories, large or small.

City of Culver City has a very detailed web site on their redevelopment activities. It includes agendas, mission statements, actual projects underway, potential new projects, etc. Seems like a good model to emulate for other cities who haven’t yet made this much progress.

http://www.culvercity.org/citygov/redevelop/redevlp.asp

The article below provides an interesting historical perspective on Superfund and progress on NPL sites.

Established in 1980, under CERCLA, in the amount of $1.8bil. At that time, common belief was that sufficient funds and technology existed to clean up all abandoned hazardous waste sites by 1985.

By 1985, only six sites had been completely remediated. In 1986, the Superfund was replenished to $8.5bil.

By 2002, 810 sites had “construction completed” status.

The article also provides a summary of some remediation methods.

Article below is by Charles Bartch (read more about Charles here http://www.iedconline.org/index.php?p=Instructor_Bartsch) of the Northeast-Midwest Institute (www.nemw.org).

Policy staff at The Northeast-Midwest Institute have been exploring brownfield financing strategies/ideas, internally and at the Congressional Coalition Forums that they host and at strategy groups. Much of there work has been embraced by members of the 104th Congress, and will be profiled during the Coalition’s brownfields “summit,” scheduled for July 10 on Capitol Hill.

Tax Incentives

Capital Attraction Incentives

Initiatives to Support Financing

For purposes of generating discussion, I’m a landowner.

Maybe….I bought a manufacturing company that had been operating for years. Once I took control, I found out the previous owner had been allowing contaminants to seep into the slab of my building and possibly to affect soil and/or groundwater.

Or maybe…..I’ve owned a manufacturing company for years and that pesky shop foreman has bothered me once too many times about the leaky fuel tank out back. I’m going to look into it once and for all to make him stop complaining.

Question: Where do I start? Should I call the City…what department? Should I call the County….what department? Should I call an environmentalist? Should I call that divorce attorney I met at the club? Or should I just rent a backhoe and start digging around out back to see what the problem is?

Question: Are you with the City or the County or a law firm or a consulting firm, or somewhere else? What are your thoughts on where my first call should be?

The attached file includes an article on pages 8-12 by Richard G. Opper, the founding partner of Opper and Varco, LLP, (www.envirolawyer.com), in San Diego, CA.

The article is a very helpful introduction to the Polanco Redevelopment Act, which provides that a redevelopment agency can demand that owners (and other responsible parties) propose and carry out a remedial plan for a property within a project area. If the demand is ignored, the agency can either undertake the work itself and bill back to owners/responsible parties, or force the owners/responsible parties to take on a clean up themselves.

A recent (from 9/03) survey showed that about 60 of the State’s 350 redevelopment agencies were using the act, or had used it. This is not a “last-minute” solution. Using the Act takes lots of foresight.

Ironically, brownfield redevelopment and political circumstances surrounding 9/11 caused a lessening of CERCLA/Superfund liabilities for landowners and therefore affected redevelopment agencies’ abilities to enforce Polanco. Nonetheless, use of the Polanco act has increased.

Question: Have any of our readers been involved with a transaction or development assisted by the Polanco Act? Please tell us about it. Did it help make for a redevelopment that otherwise wouldn’t have happened? Was it an efficient or painful process? Was it worth it?

Question: It seems like the obvious question is, “does the Polanco Act get used only when a redevelopment project area exist to facilitate the act?…..or do cities actually create redevelopment project areas specifically in order to be able to use the Polanco Act on key sites?

Question: Do any of our readers have any other comments?

Click Here To Link To Article

Obviously grants can be made/received for purposes of remediating a site. This article shows that grants can be made/received for purposes of investigating possible contamination.

The Canadian Urban Institute’s annual Brownie Awards program recognizes leadership, innovation and environmental sustainability in brownfields redevelopment across Canada. Working with key industry and professional organizations, the Canadian Urban Institute presents its awards at its Brownfields conference, held in October each year.

BEDI is associated with Community Planning and Development of U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

It appears BEDI grant funds are primarily targeted for use with a particular emphasis upon the redevelopment of brownfields sites in economic development projects and the increase of economic opportunities for low-and moderate-income persons as part of the creation or retention of businesses, jobs and increases in the local tax base.