E.P.A. awards $400,000 brownfields cleanup grant for public park in San Francisco’s Bayview Hunters Point neighborhood

SAN FRANCISCO - The E.P.A. announced today that the City and Co. of San Francisco will gain $400,000 in federal funds to clean up the location of a future public park in the Bayview Hunters Point neighborhood. San Francisco is among 147 communities nationwide receiving backing to assess and clean up historically contaminated properties, also known as brownfields, for reuse and development.

"EPA is committed to helping communities strengthen their local economy and neighborhoods by cleaning up abandoned industrial and commercial properties - places where environmental cleanups and new jobs are needed most," said Jared Blumenfeld, EPA's Regional Administrator for the Pacific Southwest. "San Francisco will use these funds to transform a formerly contaminated property into a park and add an important link in the city's Blue Greenway."

San Francisco Department of Recreation and Parks will use the brownfields funds to clean up the contaminated property along Innes Avenue, which will later be developed into a public park. The plan builds on work completed by the city with previous E.P.A. brownfields grants and technical assistance. The park will help close a gap in the San Francisco Blue Greenway, a suggested multi-purpose path though parks, public open space and recreation areas along 13 miles of waterfront from AT&T Park in China Basin south to the city limits past Candlestick Park. The trail will serve as a connector between the southeastern neighborhoods and downtown, and provide much-needed open space for recreation in Bayview Hunters Point.

Since the inception of EPA's brownfields plan in 1995, cumulative plan investments have leveraged in excess of $22 billion from a variety of public and private sources for cleanup and redevelopment activities. This equates to an average of $17.79 leveraged per E.P.A. brownfields dollar expended. These investments have resulted in approximately 105,942 jobs nationwide. EPA's brownfields plan empowers states, communities, and other stakeholders to work together to assess, safely clean up, and sustainably reuse brownfields sites.

More information on EPA's brownfields program: http://www.epa.gov/brownfields/

More information on the Blue Greenway: http://www.sfparksalliance.org/our-work/blue-greenway

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