Missoula Hosts Workshop on Cleaning, Using Brownfields

By Robert Struckman, 9-03-08

A workshop on the cleanup and reuse of brownfields will be held today, Thursday, Sept. 4, at the Missoula City Council Chambers at 140 W. Pine St. and, in the afternoon, at the Missoula County Courthouse less than a block away at 200 W. Broadway, rooms 201 and 374.

Anyone interested is welcome to attend, including local officials, developers, landowners, bankers, lenders, community leaders, attorneys and consultants as well as the general public or anyone who fits some, all or none of the labels mentioned above. (Registration is $25 and can be done online or in person at 8 a.m. at the Council Chambers.)

The workshop is about how brownfield properties can be tools for economic development and revitalization. Brownfields are abandoned or underused industrial or commercial sites where redevelopment is hindered by real or perceived environmental contamination.

The workshop is co-sponsored by Missoula’s city government and the National Association of Local Government Environmental Professionals.

The goal of the workshop is to teach locals how to unlock the values in their communities and offer ideas for how people can collaborate to do so. One featured speaker is David Lloyd, the director of the Office of Brownfields and Land Revitalization in the Environmental Protection Agency and Richard Opper, director of Montana’s Deparment of Environmental Quality. Subjects of the panels will include partnerships in cleanup and redevelopment, community outreach and the management of liability.

For more information, contact Farleigh Wolfe at (202) 448-9214 or Kisha Schlegel at (406) 258-3688 or kschlegel@co.missoula.mt.us.

Like this story? Get more! Sign up for our free newsletters.