PROVIDENCE – The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency today awarded 10 grants totaling $1.6 million to help assess, clean up and redevelop blighted commercial and industrial properties in Rhode Island.
Stephen Perkins, director of the Office of Ecosystem Protection at the EPA’s New England Regional Office in Boston, was joined for the announcement at Providence City Hall by Mayor David N. Cicilline and W. Michael Sullivan, director of the R.I. Department of Environmental Management.
The awards were among 294 Brownfields grants nationwide, totaling $70.7 million – $18 million for projects across New England – that were announced today by the EPA.
“Environmental restoration and economic development go hand in hand,” said U.S. Sen. Jack Reed, who as a member of the Senate Banking Committee has consistently supported the EPA Brownfields grants. For every acre of brownfields that is reclaimed, the EPA estimates, 4.5 acres of green space are saved.
The program “is good for the environment but it’s also good for the local economy,” Reed said in a statement. “By redeveloping brownfields, we can revitalize neighborhoods and provide new opportunities for economic growth and job creation.”
The Ocean State grants announced today were chosen via a competitive process from among more than 800 applications nationwide.
The DEM received $200,000 to perform a community-wide assessment of hazardous materials issues in Providence.
The remainder of the Ocean State grants were for site cleanup and redevelopment efforts: The City of Pawtucket was awarded $600,000 to clean up properties on Front Street. Woonasquatucket Valley Community Build received $400,000 to clean up properties at the former Providence Steel and Iron. Grants of $200,000 each were awarded to the Omni Development Corporation to clean up the former John and Thomas Hope Co. site and the Rhode Island Family Life Center to clean up two parcels on Plainfield Street.
“These funds will directly improve the quality of life in these Rhode Island communities, where citizens are working to redevelop and put to good use abandoned, contaminated parcels,” Robert W. Varney, regional administrator of EPA’s New England office, said in a statement.
The EPA Brownfields Program promotes the redevelopment of abandoned and contaminated waste sites. Since 1994, it has awarded more than $150 million in funding nationwide and $17 million for projects in Rhode Island. Additional information is available at www.epa.gov/region1/brownfields.
