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| State Could Help in Local Environmental Clean-Ups |
The state could end up giving the City of Galesburg help in trying to clean-up the environmental hazards on two sites that businesses once sat on, and the city council is being urged to allow that to happen sooner rather than later.
Aldermen during a work session Monday night agreed to allow the city to move forward with attempts to seek federal economic stimulus dollars available from the state to clean up the site of the former Gulf gas station next to the old Regency hotel, and seek state revolving loans that may be available to clean up the former Paintcraft site on South Henderson Street.
Galesburg Community Development Director Roy Parkin says the time is now to seek the funds through the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency on both projects.
"IEPA has funding available at this point in time for both of those sites," Parkin said. "But that funding is available for only a limited time. So, we can't wait until next year, and think that we're going to have the funding available. If we don't use it, they're going to go elsewhere from that standpoint. So, if the council does want to pursue cleanup of these two sites now, it's really imperative that we initiate action very shortly."
Parkin says both sites are referred to as "Brownfield" sites -- meaning, there's a possibility both could be redeveloped for prospective businesses if they've been found to have environmental contaminants in the ground at both sites that can be cleaned up.
In the case of the Paintcraft site, he says it could cost as much as $350,000 to clean up according to a consultant a previous state grant has paid for the use of.
Parkin says a state revolving loan program could be tapped for that, which could be forgiven if they city isn't able to sell the land at a price equal to the cost of the cleanup. |
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| 02 16 10 by Newsroom |
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