Brownfield Programs

The 39th Senatorial District in New York has an incredible resource that most other districts don’t. That’s miles of Hudson River access along the west side right in the birthplace of our great nation. Its shores provided centuries of nourishment, trade routs and eventually manufacturing incentives.

In decades passed, our industrial ports were prone to pollutants that contaminated our precious land resources. Even miles inland, we saw the careless actions of some industries render their footprint unusable for generations to follow. These are called brownfields.

Believe it or not, during the Pataki Administration, our leaders in Albany set out to create the Brownfield Cleanup Program. [BCP]  One thing I still admire is the stewardship of the environment that Pataki portrayed. The tradition continues in Governor Paterson.

The BCP mission is to provide greater incentives for the reuse and redevelopment of brownfields, defined as "any real property, the redevelopment or reuse of which may be complicated by the presence or potential presence of a contaminant."

There are numerous Brownfield sites scattered throughout the district from Kingston to Woodbury to Wallkill; each with its own history and level of contamination. Some suffer from lack of economic planning, some from lack of political will. Those that gain attention and sufficient funding, become a catalyst for neighborhood revival.

My years of serving the public in the County Parks Commission, combined with the recent addition to my own family, compel me to assume the role of brownfield reclaimer. Our upstate economy depends on the perception that we are the green future of the Hudson Valley.

The DEC is responsible for the implementation of the program, whereas they set the eligibility guidelines for the BCP. They have sometimes been subject to harsh criticism by practitioners who find the guidelines too restrictive but these guidelines are necessary for they provide a framework for the DEC's evaluation of whether sites meet the definition of brownfield or not.

As well meaning the program is, it needs to be restructured to increase tax credit levels based on the expense of each individual project while preventing the abuse that remains a possibility for some developers. Indeed, this is a worthy program, but needs to evolve as the economy shifts from manufacturing to sustainable resource industries.