Rawlins is getting a $500,000 Brownfields Assessment grant to develop maintaining and revitalization plans for a lot of 20 homes in an effort to remediate environmental, together with human side effects while giving the town’s economy a boost.
The grant is part of the Biden administration’s effort to build up cleanup of brownfield sites—homes where toxic compounds and other problems dissuade redevelopment. The money comes from the System Investment and Jobs Take Act and is designed to further national environmental rights initiatives.
“EPA’s Brownfields Program also advances Director Biden’s Justice40 Initiative to prioritize 40% of the overall benefits of certain national investments to disadvantaged local communities,” the EPA said in a prepared statement.
Even during the recent economic expansion that saw Rawlins’ east side blossom with new hotels, gas stations, retail stores, and eateries, many “old-town” buildings remained boarded up and usually “ignored,” said Pam Thayer, executive director of Rawlins Downtown Development Authority-Main Street.
Liability concerns over the product, lead, and other hazardous substances keep homes like the classic Wyoming Icon and Sun Motel down prospective buyers’ lists, she said. But with resources to evaluate and clean up such problems, those homes—many in key locations—become assets for business improvement.
“This may touch many of those unloved buildings in the city of Rawlins,” Thayer said. “It will also help make sure we’re taking care of our existing community that has been here through the thick and the thin.”
Brownfield efforts
You will discover more than 400,000 brownfields in the U.S., according to the EPA, together with potentially many hundreds in Wyoming.
Rawlins, Dubois, Shoshoni, Laramie, Sheridan, Cheyenne, and many more Wyoming neighborhoods have enrollment properties in the federal brownfields program, in accordance with federal and state representatives. Federal brownfield revitalization campaigns in the state have, for instance, cleaned up vehicle repair yards, classic hotels, legacy mine facilities, and a livestock feed generator.
The Evanston Roundhouse project was awarded brownfields funding, as was the former Acme Power in Sheridan County and the Crook County Museum—formerly the Stoney School.
All told, EPA has assessed 108 properties throughout Wyoming as potential brownfields, according to the agency. Thirty-two marked Wyoming brownfields—over 750 acres of property—have successfully been remediated to achieve “reuse,” according to EPA’s Brownfield Project Manager Barbara Hansen Benoy.
Since the EPA’s brownfields program is aimed at community revitalization, the agency granted hundreds of dollars to the Wyoming Business Council in 2018 to aid Wyoming communities and areas in enrolling sites in the program.
“In general, there are many homes and complexes, even in smaller towns, which might be considered brownfields,” Wyoming Business Council Loan Portfolio Manager Chris Wendling told WyoFile.
In Rawlins, the $500,000 Brownfields Test grant will assist in funding one of three test projects at present in the works, according to Rawlins officials. The effort’s focus is on legacy business areas that have not usually been on the radar for new investors.
For instance, the long-abandoned Old West Lodge on West Pine St is near established properties. Currently, it’s a blight on the neighborhood, Thayer said. But brownfield revitalization dollars can help clean up the problems, make better use of the property, and elevate the value of the neighborhood around it in the process.
The same potential applies to existing and potential brownfield properties in the historic downtown district.
“If we can redevelop [brownfield properties] and put them back on the tax rolls—it’s a win-win,” Thayer said.
Though Wyoming and the EPA continue to work on brownfield redevelopment efforts, the state could additionally help budget-strapped communities sort out the process, Thayer added. State and municipal lobbyists have been asking the Legislature to provide financial help.
Rep. Trey Sherwood (D-Laramie) sponsored House Bill 135 – Cities and towns-abandoned and nuisance buildings recording. The bill failed, but it may have provided communities a tax credit “for expenses to improve completely abandoned and nuisance buildings.”
Dustin Bleizeffer is a Storie for The America Corps person covering strength and problems at WyoFile. He has been successful as a fossil fuel miner, an oilfield auto mechanic, and for twenty-five years as a statewide reporter and editor, generally…
