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EPA Awards $200,000 To Ogdenburg, New York For National Brownfields Pilot Project

Release Date: 05/06/1998
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(#98048) Ogdensburg, N.Y. -- The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) today awarded $200,000 to Ogdensburg, New York to begin a Brownfields Assessment Demonstration Pilot. The city will use the money to identify and assess contaminated waterfront sites that the city plans to clean up and redevelop. This grant is part of a national program administrated by EPA. The goal of EPA's national Brownfield Economic Redevelopment Inititative is to renew industrial and commercial properties where expansion or redevelopment is complicated by real or perceived environmental contamination.

"The Brownfields program represents an opportunity to return dormant lands to productivity," said Jeanne M. Fox, EPA Region 2 Administrator. "The goal is to make these sites clean, job-creating, profit-producing assets once more. By re-using brownfields, we can help preserve our green fields -- open areas that have not been used for development."

For more than a century, Ogdensburg was home to a large number of manufacturing industries that used the Saint Lawrence River for transportation. Most of these sites are now abandoned. Suspected contamination at these sites has hindered their redevelopment. Ogdensburg will focus its efforts on three separate waterfront sites, comprising one-third of the total industrial land available for redevelopment. The city will conduct site assessments of these areas. It will also design a program to clean up the sites, if necessary, and will encourage the use of the New York State Voluntary Cleanup Program.

Since 1995, EPA has granted 121 pilots, allowing communities to begin the process of redeveloping brownfields. This year alone, EPA will expand the program nationally by 100 new Brownfields Assessment Demonstration Pilots. Several hundred municipalities applied for Brownfields grants in 1996 and 1997. There are ten cities or counties in New York that have been awarded brownfield grants. Ogdensburg is the most recent addition to the list, along with Niagara County and Yonkers. In past years, Niagara Falls, Buffalo, New York City, Rome, Rochester, Elmira, and Glen Cove have also received brownfields grants.

For more information contact:
Richard Cahill, Press Office
EPA Region 2
290 Broadway
NY, NY 10007-1866
Voice: 212-637-3666 FAX: 212-637-5046 E-Mail: cahill.richard@epamail.epa.gov