[CPEO-BIF] Our collective soft spots.....area wide BFs regeneration

["Joe Schilling" <jms33@vt.edu>]

Well...Peter, my apologies for hitting you in your soft spot, but it's good
to know that several of us share the same Achilles heel.

And I do agree with Lenny that it would be great if a state (as I don't
think it will start with EPA) was willing to start by establishing some
simple policy criteria for allocating their Brownfields $$ to give a higher
score to those projects with greater community impact. Those with a higher
score would get a better deal.  Perhaps a certain % of state incentives
could be allocated to such projects that serve more community/neighborhood
redevelopment goals.  I know some private developers might shudder at the
thought, but it's essentially no different, and probably less intrusive than
many local impact fees.  The trick is to make the processes as simple and
painless as possible.

JMS 
 

-----Original Message-----
From: brownfields-bounces@list.cpeo.org
[mailto:brownfields-bounces@list.cpeo.org] On Behalf Of Peter B Meyer
Sent: Monday, July 02, 2007 5:47 PM
To: brownfields@list.cpeo.org
Subject: Re: [CPEO-BIF] Re: Brownfields Digest, Vol 34, Issue 25

I have a sense that we are returning to the subject of brownfield subsidy
allocation logics that we were debating last year as I read Lenny's response
to Joe.

As my research colleague and partner Kristen Yount put it after read Joe's
comment, "Peter, he hit you in your soft spot..." --  since I DO have a soft
spot for community regeneration and area-wide approaches to brownfield
redevelopment. My logic in that regard is simple: you are not going to turn
around and clean up hundreds of thousands of 1/4 - 1 acre sites -- the
majority of brownfield sites -- by tackling them in isolation.  They are
part of the community structure in which they are physically located and
thus have to be addressed as part of an area-wide strategy. 

But an area strategy, which EPA's brownfields office appears to welcome,
does not require, or even necessarily benefit from, a diversion of the funds
needed to address contamination issues. Joe Schilling is certainly right
that the brownfields program is THE lead federal regeneration effort these
days, whatever the putative roles of HUD or the Economic Development
Administration. We desperately need the lead that the EPA funds provide when
we look at older areas that have suffered disinvestment after intensive use.

But Lenny is also completely correct in arguing that the current residents
and businesses in the neighborhoods and communities that the brownfield
funds are supposed to help should benefit from those resources. The funds
are not used for social and environmental good if they generate displacement
through gentrification, and brownfield sites' neighbors, who already have
paid the price of living with the environmental threats or damage, should
not have to pay again by being displaced or not benefitting from public
subsidies provided to developers  to which they have contributed as
taxpayers.

Granting Joe's argument over the need to regenerate areas, not isolated
sites, I hope we also can agree with Lenny's prescription that, "Subsidies
should be provided to entities with community benefit missions 
or, if provided to private developers, linked to community benefit
packages."
 
Peter

Peter B. Meyer
Professor Emeritus of Urban Policy and Economics
Director, Center for Environmental Policy & Management
University of Louisville
WEB:  <http://cepm.louisville.edu>
- - - - -
Director of Applied Research
Center for Public Leadership and Public  Affairs
Northern Kentucky University
- - - - - - 
3205 Huntersridge Lane
Taylor Mill, KY 41015
502-45-3240 (cell)


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