Middletown Receives $300K Federal Grant For Brownfield Cleanup

MIDDLETOWN, CT — Middletown will receive a $300,000 federal grant for brownfield cleanup assessment that will go toward revitalizing the city’s riverfront, officials announced Wednesday. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency awarded five grants worth $2.3 million for six projects in Connecticut to assess and clean up contaminated properties under the agency's Brownfields Program.

In addition to Middletown, grants were awarded to the Capitol Region Council of Governments in Hartford, the Naugatuck Valley Council of Governments, the City of New Haven and two projects in Shelton.

Middletown Mayor Ben Florsheim said the “highly competitive” grant will go toward cleaning up four former industrial sites along the riverfront.

“This is a big deal for our downtown and will go a long way towards making a revitalized riverfront a reality,” Florsheim said.

Middletown will be awarded a $300,000 Assessment Grant to conduct environmental site assessments, develop cleanup plans, and support reuse planning and community outreach activities for various sites to be selected throughout the grant, according to a news release. The city's Riverfront area, which includes one Qualified Opportunity Zone, is the focus of the assessment grant. Priority sites include the Peterson Oil Company, the OMO site, Sumner Brook, and Jackson Corrugated Container sites.

"I am thrilled that EPA has awarded this important funding to the City of Middletown,” Florsheim said in a statement. “All four sites that will be assessed for remediation are critical to the future of Middletown's riverfront, and this type of federal investment is indicative of how important that riverfront is to our whole region. I also want to thank Middletown's congressional delegation for their support, as well as students at the University of Connecticut Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, who partnered with city staff to write our grant proposal. Their expertise was critical to crafting a winning application, and I am looking forward to working with them, the EPA, and the whole community to move this project forward in a collaborative way."