EPA awards New Orleans $1 million for community cleanup projects

The Environmental Protection Agency has awarded $1 million in brownfields funding to the City of New Orleans to help revitalize three abandoned wharfs along Market, Celeste and Orange Streets.

Brownfields are vacant, abandoned, or under-used properties where redevelopment may be complicated by the presence or potential presence of environmental contamination. City leaders plan to use the brownfields grant to redevelop the wharfs as part of the proposed Riverfront Park project.

“The brownfields program is the bedrock of EPA efforts to cleanup and reuse the nation’s contaminated properties,” said EPA Regional Administrator Richard E. Greene. “With these brownfields grants, Louisiana is helping pave the way toward cleaner communities and better lives.”

In addition to the New Orleans grant, EPA also awarded a $200,000 brownfields cleanup grant to the Progressive Church in Marrero. The church is completing cleanup of a 20-acre site that it plans to redevelop into a Family Life Center, school, day care facility, and affordable housing center for seniors.

Earlier this year, EPA also awarded another $200,000 brownfields petroleum assessment grant to the City of Lake Charles to revitalize portions of downtown, the Charpentier District and the North Lake Charles area.

Since the beginning of the program in 1995, EPA Region 6 has provided more than $11 million for Louisiana brownfields projects, including:
* $5.9 million for assessments,
* $3.85 million for revolving loan funds,
* $1.69 million for cleanups, and
* Approximately $400,000 for job training.

EPA’s brownfields program encourages redevelopment of America’s estimated 450,000 abandoned and contaminated waste sites. Nationally, brownfields assistance has leveraged more than $9.8 billion in cleanup and redevelopment, helped create more than 43,900 jobs and resulted in the assessment of more than 11,500 properties and the cleanup of 180 properties. EPA Region 6 accounts for 25 percent, or $2 billion, of the funding leveraged across the nation.

Additional information on the brownfields recipients is available at http://www.epa.gov/brownfields.

To learn more about activities in EPA Region 6, please visit www.epa.gov/region6.