Pinellas County Wins $400,000 Brownfields Assessment Grant For Lealman and Cross Bayou

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced today that Pinellas County has been awarded a competitive grant for $400,000.00. The grant is for Brownfield assessments and funds environmental testing on real estate where real or perceived contamination is hindering redevelopment. With the grant funding, the Pinellas County Brownfield program will offer expanded incentives for redevelopment. Focal areas for the local program are the Cross Bayou watershed and the Lealman community. Successful Brownfield redevelopment in these areas will result in local job growth, community investment, and an enhanced tax base. Brownfield redevelopment includes economic development, community redevelopment, improved open space/green space, and environmental restoration.

Suzanne Christman, Senior Business Development Manager for Pinellas County Economic Development, was pleased that the award would further the goals of Pinellas County’s Economic Development and Redevelopment Plans.  “We are delighted to have been selected for this opportunity and I applaud Joyce Gibbs, Environmental Program Manager, for her efforts in this process. The Brownfield Program supports our local efforts to combine redevelopment and environmental restoration as mutual goals for Pinellas County.”

A Brownfield site is a property in which expansion, redevelopment or reuse may be complicated by the presence or perceived presence of a contaminant.  Pinellas County is working in partnership with EPA’s Brownfields Program which empowers communities and stakeholders in economic development to work together to prevent, assess, safely clean up and provide sustainable reuse of Brownfields. Under the Brownfields Law, EPA provides financial assistance to eligible applicants through four competitive grant programs: assessment grants, revolving loan fund grants, cleanup grants and job training grants. 

For more information regarding Pinellas County’s Brownfield Program, contact Joyce Gibbs, Environmental Program Manager, (727) 464-7319, jgibbs@pinellascounty.org, or visit www.SiliconBay.org.