BATH

The City of Bath is getting $400,000 in EPA grant funds.

The announcement came Wednesday that Bath had been awarded a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Brownfields Assessment Grant, which are used for efforts to redevelop sites that may have contamination issues hindering development.

The EPA selected Bath for two grants: $200,000 for hazardous substances, which will be used to conduct four Phase I and four Phase II environmental assessments; and $200,000 for petroleum, which will be used to conduct five Phase I and five Phase II environmental assessments. The funds also will be used to support community outreach activities and cleanup planning.

A brownfield site is real property where expansion, redevelopment or reuse of which may be complicated by the presence or potential presence of a hazardous substance, pollutant or contaminant. The EPA’s Brownfields program provides financial assistance to eligible applicants through four competitive grant programs: assessment grants, revolving loan fund grants, cleanup grants and job training grants. Additionally, funding support is provided to state and tribal response programs through a separate mechanism.

Bath City Manager Bill Giroux said Brownfields funds have helped the city clean up properties with an eye toward redevelopment. Past Brownfields-funded projects in Bath include cleanup of the Donald Small School, home to the city’s recreation center; the site of the Hampton Inn on Commercial Street; and demolition of the former car wash on Leeman Highway.

Sometimes these brownfields sites sit for decades and even centuries, Giroux said.

“Without this grant program, a lot of them wouldn’t get cleaned up,” he said.

Giroux said the program has proven to lead to redevelopment of old industrial sites, which could have housed, for example, fuel depots, chemical sites or gas stations.

The city-wide assessment grant is a result of an application the city submitted identifying potential projects such as the Sewell Farm site between High Street and Crawford Drive, where there was a tank farm and fuel storage facility.

Redeveloping a site like that, Giroux said, which may be in a residential area where residential permits won’t be granted for contaminated property, the city would assess it for contamination and recommend a cleanup plan and try to get a developer access to lowinterest funds for cleanup efforts.

“It works for everybody that way,” he said.

Including the Bath grant, the EPA announced Wednesday the award of $3.8 million total in grants for Maine communities. Other recipients include the cities of Bangor, Belfast and Biddeford, Community Library in Lyman, Congress Street Hill Property LLC in Belfast, Hancock County Planning Commission, Town of Kittery, Northern Maine Development Commission, Southern Maine Planning and Development Commission, and Washington County Council of Governments.