In many of the communities that I visit, there is a common problem of a contaminated property. It is considered blight, and in most cases, there is a consensus that the blight should be remedied. Sometimes it is a downtown property, as it was in Downingtown, with the O’Brien Machinery property, and other times it is in a residential area like in Forest Hills.

Much of what has happened in the past was done without bad intentions. There was a time when toxic chemicals were not known to be toxic. In 1971, I worked for the AFL-CIO in their national headquarters and concentrated on something new, the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA). I was responsible for documenting regulations as they were promulgated in the Federal Register.

I remember when the first Threshold Limit Values of toxic substances were published. I also remember how there were 12 chemicals left off the list the second time that they released this information in the Federal Register. I caught it and brought it to everyone’s attention. Someone commented that the AFL-CIO had someone who actually read and understood the regulations, and I got a raise, $5 a week.

Fast-forward to Anytown USA today, and you see the effects of what happened in a simpler time. It is called a Brownfield. No one wanted to pollute but they did not know what was toxic and what was not. In Forest Hills, they had a nuclear reactor located right in a residential area.

Pennsylvania has been at the forefront of helping clean up sites through the Act 2 process. Grants are available to assess a property and clean up the property if the remedial assessment proves to be positive. The good part about the grants is that they are 75 percent grants, with the 25 percent match, that being 25 percent of the entire amount of the project. In other words, in order to secure a grant for a million dollars, you need to put supply $333,333 in match. The match is 25 percent of the total, so for every dollar you put into the project, you create a larger total because the total will exceed the one million dollars. This was a hard concept for me to understand in the beginning.

There also is a federal EPA grant for the assessment and the cleanup, but the Feds are not quite as generous as the state, as they only will fund 50 percent of the costs. The Fed money is a little different inasmuch as the regulations concerning the use are a little more restrictive and it does not appear as user friendly as the state money. It is still easy to use, and offers an alternative to the state money. The Federal money also will fund Phase 1 studies before the property is purchased. 

The process does not only provide funds to assess and clean up, but also provides a liability release for the new owner. This is a huge benefit for those who seek to redevelop a Brownfield. It makes the process easier for the developer to buy a contaminated property and clean it up and reuse the property to create jobs or housing.  

I live in the Brownfield that I remediated in Downingtown for housing, and I hope to put a school on the one in Forest Hills. These sites with significant pollution were put into productive use.

So you say, “Barry… what is the newsflash?” These properties are usually significantly cheaper than other properties. Most times the pollution is not as bad as it would appear.  Remember, in most cases, the people who polluted did not think they were doing anything wrong, and in many instances took reasonable care if they thought something was wrong. There are incidents of petroleum spills that remain on the surface and do not migrate to the ground water. In cases of cities, where everyone is on city water, and although still serious, it poses less of a threat to the populous.

In some instances there was an old insurance policy on the property that did not have a toxic substance exclusion. In those cases, the insurance company is responsible for the clean up. It takes a lot of research but sometimes it pays off.

As land prices rise, and Greenfields become less and less likely to be developed at the density that most developers would like, the Brownfield has become a valuable alternative. Many times local political subdivisions will seek to get a Brownfield back on the productive tax rolls, and will work with a developer to increase density and make the property more income intensive.

Barry Cassidy is a freelance grant and economic development consultant. He can be reached at barrycassidy@comcast.net.