Applications for 2019 Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) brownfield grants are now being accepted. The Request for Proposals and the Application Guidelines officially open the FY 2019 Brownfields Multipurpose, Assessment, and Cleanup Grant competition. Applications for these grants are due January 31st, 2019.
Grants offered by the EPA Brownfields Program may be used by local governments, tribes and non-profit organizations to address known or suspected contaminated sites. In March of 2018 the Brownfields Utilization, Investment and Local Development (BUILD) Act was enacted. The BUILD Act reauthorized EPA’s Brownfields Program and made several important changes that affect the grant programs that are described on the EPA Grants web page.
Opportunities in this cycle of brownfield grant funding are separated into three categories:
Multipurpose Grants: This new grant provides funding to conduct activities including assessments, community involvement, planning, developing remediation plans and cleanup at one or more brownfield sites in a target area. Each proposal is funded up to $800,00 over five years. EPA anticipates selecting 10 proposals.
Assessment Grants: Community-wide and site-specific proposals are each funded up to $200,000 over three years. Assessment Coalition proposals are funded up to $600,000 over three years. EPA anticipates selecting 114 proposals.
Cleanup Grants: Each proposal is funded up to $500,000 over three years. EPA anticipates selecting 40 proposals.
During last year’s brownfield grant competition, EPA awarded more than $54 million nationwide.
EPA will host a webinar on Tuesday, December 11, 2018 at 1:00 p.m. CST to discuss the 2019 grants. You can join here, or dial into the audio conference at 1-866-299-3188.
EPA Region 5-specific webinars will be held on Tuesday, December 17 at 10:00 a.m. and on Thursday, December 19 at 1:00 p.m. (both CST) to review some of the most important information from the previous week’s webinar and to answer questions about the guidelines. Join here, or dial into the audio conference at 1-202-991-0477. The access code for that call is 9100517.
Additional resources for FY 2019 MAC Grant Applications can be found at the Office of Brownfields and Revitalization website.