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EPA awards $950,000 to Nevada groups in Brownfields grants

Release Date: 5/10/2005
Contact Information: Margot Perez-Sullivan, 415.947.4149

SAN FRANCISCO -- Today the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency awarded a collective $950,000 to three Nevada groups -- The Nevada Division of Environmental Protection, North Las Vegas Redevelopment Agency and Nye County -- for assessment and inventories of Nevada brownfields.

Nationally, the EPA awarded 302 grants totaling $75.9 million today as part of the agency’s Brownfields program, which provides funding to clean up and redevelop contaminated properties.

“Funding for brownfields projects will allow communities to revitalize properties that have been sitting idle far too long,” said Wayne Nastri, regional administrator of the EPA’s Pacific Southwest office. “The program yields positive results by bringing new life to the under used properties in communities.”

Grants in Nevada include:
· The Nevada Division of Environmental Protection will use $350,000 for brownfields assessment and community outreach activities. Officials will perform a site assessment in Storey County, which will include sampling soil and waste, characterizing contamination and developing cleanup plans for the Gooseberry Mine site, a former gold and silver mine. The mine’s redevelopment is part of a larger effort to diversify its economic base, create jobs and rejuvenate the local economy.

· The North Las Vegas Redevelopment Agency will use $200,000 to create an inventory and prioritization of sites, along with environmental assessments and cleanup plans in the city’s two redevelopment areas. Funds will also be used to conduct community outreach. The assessments will help the city rehabilitate properties, create jobs and revitalize the economy.

· Nye County was awarded two grants totaling $400,000 to complete a brownfields inventory and perform site assessments in at least four of the six target communities. Funds will also be used for cleanup and reuse planning, land use planning, institutional controls and community outreach activities. Successful brownfields revival in any of the target communities will boost the local economy and encourage other communities to pursue brownfields redevelopment.

“The Brownfields Program puts both property and people back to work,” EPA Administrator Steve Johnson said. “These grants will help communities across America convert eyesores into engines of economic rebirth.”

The Brownfields program promotes redevelopment of America's estimated 450,000 abandoned and contaminated waste sites. Since its inception in 1995, the program has awarded 709 assessment grants totaling over $190 million, 189 revolving loan fund grants worth more than $165 million, and $26.8 million for 150 cleanup grants.

In addition to facilitating industrial and commercial redevelopment, Brownfields projects have converted industrial waterfronts to river-front parks, landfills to golf courses, rail corridors to recreational trails, and gas station sites to housing. The program has led to more than $7 billion in public and private investment in cleanup and redevelopment, helped create more than 31,000 jobs, and resulted in the assessment of more than 5,100 properties.

For more information on the grant recipients, go to: https://www.epa.gov/brownfields

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