[CPEO-BIF] "Where ‘Brownfield’ Is a Pretty Word for ‘Toxic Dump’"

[Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>]

Where ‘Brownfield’ Is a Pretty Word for ‘Toxic Dump’
One neighborhood in Connecticut has endured 30 years of living with a dangerous eyesore.



by Hugh Bailey
National Journal
September 17, 2015

In the East Side neigh­bor­hood of Bridge­port, Con­necti­c­ut, sits a de­cay­ing hulk of a fact­ory that would look right at home in any of dozens of postin­dus­tri­al cit­ies na­tion­wide. The series of build­ings was once home to a huge Re­m­ing­ton Arms plant, but the com­pany has been gone for al­most 30 years.

Once a cen­ter of jobs and prosper­ity, the site is now a sink­hole, and the sur­round­ing neigh­bor­hoods are among the poorest in the state. The pre­dom­in­antly black and Latino res­id­ents suf­fer from high crime rates and low job pro­spects, and a ma­jor reas­on is the con­tinu­al neg­lect at the former factor­ies, con­tam­in­ated with all man­ner of pol­lut­ants, around which the city was built.

Since 2002, the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment has spent more than $1.5 bil­lion to clean up thou­sands of pol­luted sites, of­ten in high-poverty urb­an neigh­bor­hoods like the East Side. The so-called brown­fields law has proven ef­fect­ive at at­tract­ing private dol­lars in­to oth­er­wise over­looked areas, bring­ing de­vel­op­ment that might nev­er have been pos­sible.

…

For the entire article, see
http://www.nationaljournal.com/next-america/economic-empowerment/where-brownfield-is-pretty-word-toxic-dump

--

Lenny Siegel
Executive Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
a project of the Pacific Studies Center
278-A Hope Street
Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650-961-8918 or 650-969-1545
Fax: 650-961-8918
LSiegel@cpeo.org
http://www.cpeo.org

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