real property where expansion or redevelopment is complicated by actual or perceived environmental contamination. The benefits of redeveloping brownfields include: promoting economic development; enabling efficient land use; minimizing the construction of new service infrastructure; facilitating the resolution of environmental justice issues; and protecting environmental and human health.
The program is funded through a cooperative agreement between the US Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) and the department. The department administers the program on behalf of a coalition of partners: the city of Coos Bay, Tri-County Metropolitan area of Portland (TriMet), city of Portland and the state of Oregon.
Purpose
The fund's primary purpose is to assist private persons and local governments to cleanup and therefore redevelop brownfields.
Eligible applicants
Any individual, business, non-profit organization, prospective purchaser, municipality, special district, port or tribe may make application to the fund. However, an applicant is not eligible for funding if any of the following general restrictions are true:
Funding would be used to pay for cleaup costs at a brownfields site where the applicant is potentially liable for having caused or contributed to the contamination (under CERCLA Section 107 or ORS 465.255).
Applicant is currently suspended, debarred or otherwise declared ineligible for federal or state funding.
The site is proposed to be, or is listed on, the US EPA National Priorities List (NPL) (i.e., superfunded sites).
Eligible projects
Loans are targeted to economic or community development projects showing the greatest need, exhibiting long-term project viability and demonstrating the capacity of repayment. A limited amount of funding is available in grants for projects on properties owned by municipalities or non-profit organizations. These grants also are targeted to economic or community development projects showing the greatest need, exhibiting long-term project viability but for which a financial analysis indicates a lack of debt repayment capacity.
Examples of eligible redevelopment projects the program will support include business development projects, industrial lands capacity projects, community facility projects and downtown or mixed use center revitalization projects. The cleanup project must be associated with redevelopment of the property.
