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Brownfields Success Stories
Pilot Spawns an Environmental Clearinghouse and City Development Corporation
The economic transformation of Birmingham's long-distressed industrial area is the focus of a collaboration between EPA and the City's North Birmingham Industrial Redevelopment Project. The project centers on a 900-acre industrial area in which nearly forty percent of formerly active property now lies vacant. By the project's completion, more than 2 million square feet of commercial and industrial space are expected to be created, along with more than 2,000 jobs. To oversee the $200,000 brownfields grant awarded by EPA in September 1995, and to ensure cooperation among various agencies, technical advisors and citizen groups, the City created the Birmingham Environmental Clearinghouse, which also acts as a repository for data on all brownfields sites within the target area. "Potential purchasers and developers can come to the Clearinghouse for site assessments and we can provide immediate answers from our database without ever leaving the office," says John Gemmill, Project Manager with the City. In the last two years, property values within the target area have doubled as a result of the brownfields project and creation of the Clearinghouse. "Property in some cases has gone from $7,000 an acre to more like $40,000 or $50,000 an acre," says Gemmill. The project's momentum led to the creation of the North Birmingham Economic Revitalization Corporation (NBERC), which works with investors and makes use of information obtained by the Clearinghouse. The NBERC purchased the 25-acre former Sloss-Sheffield Steel and Iron Company storage yard for $500,000, a deal financed entirely by AmSouth bank. According to Gemmill, the brownfields effort "has really opened up the market in this area. The City...and AmSouth Bank are financing deals that would have required a high-risk entrepreneur two years ago." For more information on the Birmingham Brownfields Pilot, contact Barbara Caprita at (404) 562-9969.