"abandoned, idled, or under used industrial and commercial facilities where expansion or redevelopment is complicated by real or perceived environmental contamination"
EPA Brownfields Assessment Demonstration Pilot Background Information
EPA's Brownfields Economic Redevelopment Initiative is designed to empower states, communities, and other stakeholders in economic redevelopment to work together in a timely manner to prevent, assess, safely clean up, and sustainably reuse brownfields. A brownfield is a site, or portion thereof, that has actual or perceived contamination and an active potential for redevelopment or reuse. EPA is funding: assessment demonstration pilot programs (each funded up to $200,000 over two years), to assess brownfields sites and to test cleanup and redevelopment models; job training pilot programs (each funded up to $200,000 over two years), to provide training for residents of communities affected by brownfields to facilitate cleanup of brownfields sites and prepare trainees for future employment in the environmental field; and, cleanup revolving loan fund programs (each funded up to $500,000 over five years) to capitalize loan funds to make loans for the environmental cleanup of brownfields. These pilot programs are intended to provide EPA, states, tribes, municipalities, and communities with useful information and strategies as they continue to seek new methods to promote a unified approach to site assessment, environmental cleanup, and redevelopment.
| United States Environmental Protection Agency Washington, D.C. 20460 |
Solid Waste and Emergency Response (5101) |
EPA 500-F-99-021 March 1999 www.epa.gov/brownfields/ |
 |
Brownfields Assessment Demonstration Pilot |
| Walpole, MA |
| Outreach and Special Projects Staff (5101) | Quick Reference Fact Sheet |
| EPA’s Brownfields Economic Redevelopment Initiative is designed to empower States, communities, and other stakeholders in economic redevelopment to work together in a timely manner to prevent, assess, safely clean up, and sustainably reuse brownfields. A brownfield is a site, or portion thereof, that has actual or perceived contamination and an active potential for redevelopment or reuse. Since 1995, EPA has funded more than 200 Brownfields Assessment Demonstration Pilots, at up to $200,000 each, to support creative two-year explorations and demonstrations of brownfields solutions. The Pilots are intended to provide EPA, States, Tribes, municipalities, and communities with useful information and strategies as they continue to seek new methods to promote a unified approach to site assessment, environmental cleanup, and redevelopment. |
PILOT SNAPSHOT
Date of Announcement: March 1999
Amount: $200,000
Profile: The Pilot targets three sites in the downtown area of Walpole.
BACKGROUND
EPA has selected the Town of Walpole for a Brownfields Pilot. Walpole (population 22,235) is a suburb 19 miles south of Boston with a history of industrial development along the Neponset River. A recent survey found Walpole to have the second-largest number of undeveloped industrial and commercial sites in the Metropolitan Boston Region, but many of these sites have been abandoned or underutilized because of real or perceived contamination. These brownfields sites pose a risk to the community's economic, environmental, and public health. Some known or suspected brownfields are located over the town's sole source aquifer that supplies Walpole's drinking water.
The Pilot will examine a group of sites located in prime commercial areas near the town's center. These include an abandoned auto garage, a 60-year-old industrial site with known contamination, the former site of the town grit facility, and an abandoned manufacturing site. The Pilot plans to select three of these sites for assessment.
OBJECTIVES
The town's objective is to clean up its brownfields sites to ensure the protection of public health and the environment by cleaning up its brownfields sites and returning them to productive use. The initial objective is to mitigate the potential threat to the town's water supply through the assessment and cleanup activities conducted at the targeted sites. To accomplish these goals, the Pilot will rely heavily on community input throughout the site identification, assessment, and cleanup planning processes.
ACCOMPLISHMENTS AND ACTIVITIES
Activities planned as part of this Pilot include:
The cooperative agreement for this Pilot has not yet been negotiated; therefore, activities described in this fact sheet are subject to change.
CONTACTS
Walpole Board of Health
(508) 660-7320
Regional Brownfields Team
U.S. EPA- Region 1
(617) 918-1209
Visit the EPA Region 1 Brownfields web site at:
http://www.epa.gov/region01/remed/brnfld/
For further information, including specific Pilot contacts, additional Pilot
information, brownfields news and events, and publications and links, visit the EPA
Brownfields web site at:
http://www.epa.gov/brownfields/
| Brownfields Assessment Demonstration Pilot March 1999 |
Walpole, Massachusetts EPA 500-F-99-021 |
