Source: https://www.mlive.com, April 19, 2016
By: Garret Ellison

What are brownfields?

“Brownfields” are properties where redevelopment is hampered by the presence of environmental contamination from past industry. Toxic chemicals from dry cleaning facilities, power plants, gas stations and other long-gone businesses make property cleanup and redevelopment cost prohibitive without some public aid, either through loans, grants or tax incentives.

In the 1990s, Michigan expanded the definition to Brownfields to encompass a wider array of blighted properties and ease liability on property owners buying contaminated land. The idea was to encourage private redevelopment through public subsidy and incentivize environmental cleanup when no responsible party was around any longer. To that end, Michigan voters passed the Environmental Protection Bond fund in 1988, which included $45 million specifically for brownfield redevelopments, and approved the Clean Michigan Initiative (CMI) in 1998, authorizing $675 million in general obligation bond funds for environmental clean up efforts. Nearly 20 years later, that money is just about all spent. Read more.