COVINGTON — It's a mission involving places no one wants to go.

        Deserted gas stations and warehouses where weeds abound, and neighbors often wonder about the environmental hazards created by a sitting tank or other chemical traces.

        And if the city has its way, then those places — called brownfields — won't be deserted or desolate anymore, but part of a thriving redeveloped urban landscape.

        The city this month received a $200,000 grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to research and redevelop the city's brownfields, properties that are vacant or underutilized because of real or perceived environmental contamination.

        Twelve such sites are already identified in Covington and the city is looking for more.

        Covington's planners, regional growth and computer experts and a Ft. Mitchell lawyer who worked on the famed Love Canal contamination case in Niagara Falls, N.Y. are some of those who are on this mission.

        The city will work with the Northern Kentucky Area Planning Commission and the Northern Kentucky University Environmental Resource Management Center to find these sites and fund a project that will help them develop a Geographic Information System-based inventory of brownfield sites in Covington.

        The GIS will be used by the planning commission to track potentially harmful brownfield sites, which is one reason why Marhsall Slagle, the director of the NKAPC, says he would like to see the brownfield research extend beyond Covington.

        “We would eventually like to go beyond Covington and countywide so that when issues come up in the future (such as highway development) we will be able to provide that data to help them as they look for new relocations,” Mr. Slagle said.

        The city of Newport received the same grant in May. Phil Ciafardini, the city manager, said Newport planned to use the money to locate brownfields which could be used to promote the city's Hope VI housing project.

        Covington applied for and received a pilot demonstration grant about two years ago. During the application process, the city formed the Brownfields Technical Committee, a group of citizens and city officials who worked together to identify brownfields in the city. The committee identified 12 sites for the grant and say they plan to use the additional funding to find more. Marshall Slagle, director of the NKAPC, said a brownfield could be anything from an abandoned gas station to a vacant area that's no longer used.

        Investigating the sites is a complicated process that will be chiefly dealt with by the ERMC, a center that provides environmental services to governments as well as business and property owners.
       

Step by step
               Scott Fennell, manager of engineering services at the ERMC, said the investigation was a “step-wise process.” The first step is an environmental assessment where the center would research the property by reviewing past documents and interviewing people who are knowledgeable about the property's history.

        The second step is an environmental investigation and is only administered if the assessment indicates contamination, he said. In this phase, environmental sampling is done to determine the extent of the contamination.

        In some instances, Mr. Fennell said, a property could be so contaminated that it would be “mothballed” or inactivated. He cited a landfill as an example of a property that would be mothballed.

        “Even though it was done purposefully, it is land that is taken out of circulation,” he said.
       

Preventing urban sprawl
               Some involved with the project hope the funding can be used to promote “smart growth.”

        Mr. Slagle, who was one of two Northern Kentuckians appointed to Gov. Paul Patton's 35-member smart growth task force in May, said redeveloping these brownfields can be a way to prevent urban sprawl. He said continuing to abandon brownfield sites makes them a “liability to the community.”

        Through researching and redeveloping these sites, he said they would be encouraging better use of the already existing infrastructure. When developers rush out to new areas, the city often has to install new water and sewer lines. By redeveloping these brownfield sites, Mr. Slagle said developers could bypass these hurdles and simply use the existing ones.

        Rehabbing existing brownfield properties is a priority for Covington, Ella Frye, director of economic development for the city, said.

        She said the city realized long ago that it was “landlocked” and needed to do something about it.

        “We need to look back at these sites that are underutilized, vacant or perceived to have some environmental issues,” she said.

        Ms. Frye said the idea of redeveloping brownfields has become popular for companies outside the area, noting that the city received phone calls from companies inquiring about available brownfields.
       

Waiting for approval
               But sometimes acquiring these brownfields can be a lengthy and expensive process.

        Just ask Greg Schneider.

        Mr. Schneider, a Covington businessman, says he's been trying to buy and redevelop a brownfield that sits right next to his business for 10 years.

        He's run his successful body shop, American Auto Body, for more than two decades. During that time, he's watched customers bring their expensive Lexus sedans in for repairs.

        He's also watched the deteriorating and, at one time, environmentally hazardous building next to him cast a dismal shadow over his shop.

        The business, located on Donaldson Avenue in Covington, sits next to what used to be the Donaldson Art Sign Co. The site was one of the 12 declared a brownfield by the Covington committee.

        He says he has been wanting to buy and redevelop the property for years but keeps “hitting a brick wall.” In Mr. Schneider's case, that brick wall has been built by the Environmental Protection Agency.

        Before Mr. Schneider can buy the property, the EPA has to declare the property safe. Some cleanup has been done on the site, which Ms. Frye said at one time was an “environmental nightmare.”

        Ms. Frye said the EPA must issue a “no further action” letter to the site before it can be sold. The site, Ms. Frye said, had already been issued a “partial no further action” letter.

        With the city's grant, Ms. Frye says she hopes future business owners, who find themselves in situations similar to Mr. Schneider's, won't have to wait as long. Now, she said these issues can be addressed in three to six months.

        “Now we can just pick up the phone with our environmental agency in Frankfort, have an open dialogue and discuss and outline a work plan,” she said.
       

Bringing in the experts
               Figuring out ways to help business owners develop brownfields is a task Jeff Harmon, an attorney with Cors & Bassett, a law firm with offices in Fort Mitchell and Cincinnati, takes seriously. Mr. Harmon began his work with brownfields years ago with the landmark Love Canal case in New York.

        In 1978, the town, built atop a 20,000-ton chemical dumpsite, was declared a disaster area by President Jimmy Carter and 7,500 residents were relocated after chemical-laced groundwater leached into neighborhoods and school grounds.

        Now he works with business owners like Mr. Schneider in the Northern Kentucky and Greater Cincinnati, in helping them purchase and redevelop brownfields. In Hamilton County, Ohio, he worked with a group of investors to help them acquire Mosler, an old manufacturing facility. The property sat dormant for years, now it is back to productive use as a warehouse.

        The move to redevelop these properties started about five years ago, he said. With urban sprawl at its greatest, it is not enough just to clean the property and make sure it is not environmentally hazardous.That property needs to be put to use, he said.

        It's not always an easy task, he said, partly because properties that were once considered environmentally contaminated always have a stigma around them.

        “You can breathe life back into these facilities if you do it right,” Mr. Harmon said.

        But for Mr. Schneider, doing it right means doing it fast.

        “Meanwhile it impacts my business,” he said. “It looks like a bomb went off.”
       

TARGETED SITES

               • Donaldson Sign, 2111-2113 Donaldson Ave. • Third and Greenup, 200 block of Greenup Street

        • Prospect, 1020 Prospect St.

        • Ninth and Madison, 901 Madison Ave.

        • 12th and Russell, 116 Russell St.

        • Former I-75 interchange, I-75 near Euclid

        • Ninth and Russell, 1820, 1830 Russell St.

        • Park & Shop lot, 109 Pike St.

        • Fourth and Main, 315-319 W. Fourth St.

        • Fifth and Johnson, 428-436 Johnson

        • Fourth and Greenup, 122 E. Fourth St.

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