With technical and financial support from the Land Bank’s Environmental Services program, three jurisdictions are taking the first steps toward remediating six environmentally challenged, abandoned properties considered to be brownfields. A $500,000 USEPA assessment grant awarded to the Land Bank is making it possible.
The grant funds Phases I and II of the remediation process and is targeting sites along the area’s five river corridors. Jurisdictions may apply to inventory, characterize, assess and conduct a range of planning activities ultimately leading to remediation.
These communities are moving forward with their projects:
- Trotwood – Two projects including part of the former Sears building at the former Salem Mall and an industrial site.
- Phillipsburg – One project involving a former platting company
- Dayton – Three projects, including a former industrial site along the Wolf Creek, an Edgemont neighborhood site intended to be repurposed for a community center and solar garden, and the 35-acre former Dayton Tire and Rubber factory site in south Dayton It is owned by Restoration Church, whose officials would like to redevelop it for housing, recreational and mixed uses.
These environmental assessments will help characterize the contaminants resulting from decades of manufacturing and other activities at these sites and position them for the Ohio Department of Development’s brownfield funds, should remediation be necessary.
