The Connecticut Department of Economic and Community Development (DECD) is now accepting applications for a new grant program designed to help communities develop implementation plans for remediating and redeveloping polluted or contaminated industrial sites, known as brownfields.
The Brownfield Area-Wide Revitalization (BAR) Planning Grant Program is a two-year, $1 million pilot program that was created by a unanimous vote in both chambers of the General Assembly and signed into law by Gov. Dannel P. Malloy this summer. It is modeled after the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Area-Wide Planning Grant program.
The pilot planning funding round, initially capitalized with $1 million, is open to municipalities, economic development agencies, and regional councils of government. Grants of up to $200,000 will be awarded competitively to eligible applicants. Eligible uses of funds include, but are not limited to, community visioning processes, market studies, mapping, inventory, infrastructure and streetscape planning and conceptual designs.
Under Malloy over just the past several years, there has been more than $130 million of state investment towards brownfield remediation, up from less than $10 million under the previous administration. For context, since 1995, the Federal Environmental protection agency has invested $190 million across the entire country. Connecticut currently has more than 100 projects in all corners of the state.
"Brownfields Area Revitalization grants are an investment that will allow communities burdened by contaminated properties to consider the best way to turn them into community assets," Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection Commissioner Rob Klee said in a statement. "These grants will provide an incentive for our cities and towns to look beyond the cleanup of a specific site – to carefully consider how multiple sites in a given area can be put back into reuse in a way that best benefits the surrounding neighborhood. We look forward to continuing to work with DECD, our cities and towns, and other government and private sector partners to make this new grant program a success and to build on Connecticut’s role as a national leader in brownfield redevelopment."
