The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has funded a Lenoir County grant application for $1 million as part of the EPA’s Brownfields Coalition Assessment grant program.

The grant was awarded to a coalition headed by Lenoir County but that includes Wayne and Greene counties and the Global TransPark. The goal of the program is to help remove barriers to development and redevelopment, helping to reduce development costs associated with environmental assessments and to potentially clean-up projects.

An example of how these funds could be used is for Phase I and II assessments that regularly have to be performed on properties acquired by the county or are being conveyed as part of the economic development agreements.

Similarly, the coalition may use these funds to help private developers assess their properties for potential contamination. These costs can be absorbed into the grant, reducing the expense for the county and developers with no matching requirement or local dollars having to be invested.

“There will be many sites that we initially target for Phase I assessment,” Lenoir County Assistant County Manager Adam Short said. “These can cost from $10,000 to $30,000, depending on the scope of the assessment. That’s now money we don’t have to use out of our coffers and, similarly, money and time a private developer may save by using grant funds in place of private dollars; we can use this grant money to remove that barrier to development.”

That’s just one example, though; there are also larger scale uses for the funds, including evaluating future uses of properties, supporting planning projects and helping expand into new, underused areas for industrial development.

“If we go in and do a Phase I on a property and we find something (that needs to be cleaned up), having our foot in the door in the assessment side opens up access to additional EPA funds on the clean-up side and we can go in and apply for additional funds that will remediate projects in situations where we find contamination,” Short said.

When Short was the Planning Director for the City of Kinston, he worked with a number of EPA assessment grants, including a project at the former shirt factory plant on N.C. 11 and the old Harvey Oil site near Historic Grainger Stadium.

“We did a lot of good work, including removing underground storage tanks,” he said.

Lenoir County Board of County Commissioners Chairman Linda Rouse-Sutton said she is excited the county has acquired these funds.

“We are excited to lead our coalition through this process,” she said. “Supporting economic development is a core focus of the Board’s strategic plan, and the Brownfields program helps to further our goal to grow and support our local economy.”