United States Government Publishing Office publisher pbl distributor dst United States Government Accountability Office Resources, Community, and Economic Development Division author aut Government Organization text government publication eng GAOREPORTS Legislative Agency Publications gao legislative 2010-08-12 U.S. Government Printing Office 1998-03-19 monographic deposited born digital 32 p. GA 1.13:RCED-98-87 https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-RCED-98-87 P0b002ee1803887bd f:rc98087 DGPO 2010-08-12 2011-03-24 GAOREPORTS-RCED-98-87 machine generated eng fdlp REPORT GAOREPORTS-RCED-98-87 RCED-98-87 Urban economic development Grant award procedures Waste disposal Hazardous substances Environment evaluation Pollution control Grants to states Industrial facilities Economically depressed areas EPA Brownfields Economic Development Initiative Superfund Program Other Written Product RCED Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the grants and agreements the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) awarded since fiscal year 1993 under two program categories of brownfield expenditures, focusing on the: (1) criteria and process EPA used to award these grants and agreements; (2) uses recipients made of these funds; and (3) monitoring and oversight EPA provided for them.<p/>GAO noted that: (1) EPA primarily uses its brownfield funds to help state, local, and tribal governments build their capacities to assess, clean up, and revitalize brownfield sites; (2) EPA is using the majority of its $126 million in brownfield funds for fiscal years 1997 and 1998 to: (a) help these groups identify, assess, characterize, and develop cleanup plans for brownfield sites; (b) provide them with seed money to create revolving loan funds that they could use to award low-interest loans for cleanups; (c) support state development of programs that provide incentives for voluntary cleanup of sites, especially brownfields; and (d) provide outreach to groups affected by brownfields, technical assistance to them on cleanup and redevelopment methods, and research for them on brownfield issues; (3) EPA is using the remaining brownfield funds for support and other program activities, such as EPA's personal costs; (4) EPA set up four broad criteria and an approval process to award funds noncompetitively to nonprofit organizations for their unsolicited proposals to provide outreach, technical assistance, research, and job training; (5) the criteria included increasing community involvement at brownfields, promoting redevelopment, providing for site assessments, and sustaining a clean environment for the future; (6) if the proposals met one of the four criteria, the managers responsible for most of the brownfield activities explained that they generally would fund the proposals if the nonprofit organization represented unique constituents affected by brownfields, such as tribes, or offered unique brownfield expertise or experience; (7) although EPA has used the same process and criteria to award a few job training grants and agreements, it is developing a strategic plan to use as criteria for making future awards; (8) since fiscal year 1993, award recipients have used $3.7 million from the 24 outreach and job training awards GAO reviewed to conduct brownfield-specific activities; (9) award recipients used additional funds from the 24 awards for outreach and job training activities in support of the broader Superfund program or other EPA programs, although some of these activities would also indirectly help promote brownfield cleanup and redevelopment; and (10) EPA staff responsible for managing the 24 awards GAO reviewed were monitoring the overall status of the budget for each award and the content and quality of recipients' activities through various means. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-RCED-98-87/html/GAOREPORTS-RCED-98-87.htm https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-RCED-98-87/pdf/GAOREPORTS-RCED-98-87.pdf GAO/RCED-98-87 https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-RCED-98-87 Other Written Product GAO/RCED-98-87; Superfund: EPA's Use of Funds for Brownfield Revitalization; Urban economic development Grant award procedures Waste disposal Hazardous substances Environment evaluation Pollution control Grants to states Industrial facilities Economically depressed areas EPA Brownfields Economic Development Initiative Superfund Program