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Community Alchemy -- Inner-city
brownfield remediation education programs turn communities
into environmental employment gold mines
Real Estate Journal - Feb 16, 2004
Joseph Sorrentino BY JOSEPH SORRENTINO
CREJ News Assistant
For years, Jermaine Hodrick scrambled for odd jobs to make
ends meet, trying his hand at telemarketing, warehousing and
construction.
In January 2003, he dropped by a community center in his South
Los Angles neighborhood. Frustrated because he could not find
any openings on the jobs board, he glimpsed a flier advertising
the Los Angeles Conservation Corps. Brownfields Program.
Hodrick had no idea what a "brownfield" was, but the program
offered free training in environmental technologies. Hodrick
had been on enough construction sites to know that environmental
field technicians were paid well.
A week later, he was at an orientation session.
The federal Environmental Protection Agency defines brownfields
as abandoned, idled or underused industrial and commercial
facilities, where expansion or redevelopment is complicated
by real or perceived contamination.
California has 90,000 to 120,000 brownfields, according to
California Center for Land Recycling. Most brownfields are
in inner cities and older suburban areas, although many rural
facilities are considered brownfields, too.
By pursuing careers in brownfield remediation, residents of
the state's most-blighted areas are bringing health and wealth
back to their communities while filling the need for skilled
environmental workers.
The brownfields program Hodrick signed up for is one of several
throughout California that offer free training to help remediate
sites within their communities.
Last year, the EPA granted the city of Los Angeles $200,000
for brownfields job training. The city in turn picked the
Los Angeles Conservation Corps to teach the classes.
The EPA has funded brownfields programs in other California
cities, including Long Beach, Oakland and San Francisco.
Young Community Developers, a nonprofit in San Francisco,
took its brownfields program one step further. Instead of
relying on environmental firms to hire its graduates, the
group formed its own environmental consulting firm, Enviro.
In Los Angeles, the Conservation Corps is charged with enrolling
50 students annually until 2005 and placing 80 percent of
its graduates with jobs. The group has trained 100 remediation
professionals since its brownfields program began in 2001.
Students must live in low-income neighborhoods - a condition
of the EPA grant. This mandate is meant to pull these communities
out of the downward spiral of economic decline.
"The economy is a huge variable when it comes to redevelopment,"
said Stephanie Shakofsky, executive director of the state
Center for Land Recycling. "Contamination adds to the woes
of the struggling communities. It adds another layer of cost
and complexity."
Learning New Job Skills
At the orientation, after a screening that weeded out a few
candidates, Hodrick and his prospective classmates watched
a video of men in hazmat suits cleaning up toxic waste.
"They look like the space suits Dustin Hoffman and Morgan
Freeman wore in that movie 'Outbreak,' about an airborne virus,"
Hodrick said.
That was enough to make a few more people walk out and never
come back.
Those who stayed went through a 32-hour asbestos class, a
32-hour lead abatement class and a 40-hour hazardous-waste
worker class. Graduates are certified in asbestos and lead
removal and as hazardous waste workers able to work in chemical-resistant
hazmat suits.
The curriculum is based, in part, on input from Los Angeles
environmental employers who sit on an advisory committee to
ensure the program fits the city's employment needs.
These employers also help fulfill another program mandate:
Graduates receive job placement assistance for one year.
Eric Brooks, a member of the Conservation Corps advisory board
and a scientist with the environmental consulting firm Camp
Dresser & McKee, has placed graduates with environmental firms
and contractors, including Aerotek E&E, Envirocon, Argus Contracting,
Todd Construction and Demolition.
Brooks got Hodrick one of his first jobs, with Eberhardt Roofing:
removing asbestos from an aging Northrop office building in
Huntington Beach.
Hodrick found himself on top of a 10-story building, in full
hazmat gear - mask, respirator and emergency air tank - pulling
up the roof and replacing the asbestos fiber while trying
not to lose his balance.
"I was afraid of heights," Hodrick said. "So that was kind
of hairy."
Last week, Hodrick was in Redlands ripping up a parking lot.
The site had been a gas pumping station and was contaminated
with low levels of arsenic. Hodrick and his co-workers replaced
the cement and the soil.
The remediation business is not steady because workers usually
are hired one project at a time. Nonetheless, Hodrick feels
secure. He is a member of Local 300 of the Laborers' International
Union of North America, which means he earns prevailing wages,
$30 an hour.
In spite of the dangers, Hodrick enjoys his work.
"It's adventurous, and I always love working with my hands,"
Hodrick said. "Not only that, but I'm giving back to the community,
in my small way."
When he signed up, Hodrick said he knew little about environmental
issues.
"Like everyone, I knew a bit about asbestos," Hodrick said,
"but I didn't know the extent of the dangers of lead. "Our
kids are playing with it. Even I was playing with it. A little
chipped paint can be very dangerous."
Empowerment Zone
Brownfields present an array of legal, regulatory and technical
concerns that preclude smooth redevelopment that could uplift
the surrounding communities.
But brownfields are just one of many deterrents to redeveloping
inner cities.
Low property values, inferior schools, absence of skilled
local labor and crime are just some of the problems that make
developers wary of inner-city projects.
Forty percent of the 200,000 residents in the federally designated
Los Angeles County Empowerment Zone live below poverty level.
Lack of education is one of the primary factors contributing
to economic distress. Almost two-thirds of zone residents
older than 25 did not graduate from high school.
In stark contrast to the zone's unskilled labor force is the
strong demand for trained environmental technicians. Brooks
said that, despite the thousands of sites in need of assessment
and remediation, environmental employers have difficulty recruiting
skilled workers.
"Most contractors are hiring people off the street with no
experience, no training," he said. "These contractors have
to pay out of their pocket to bring people up to speed." Workers
must be certified for the specific hazardous substance that
they are hired to remove, Brooks added.
Moreover, this type of job, which involves working long hours,
lugging heavy equipment and dealing with hazardous substances,
turns off many people.
"People do it because it puts food on the table," Brooks said.
Local environmental companies want to hire graduates from
the brownfields program because they are highly trained and
possess multiple certifications.
Employers also get tax breaks for hiring brownfields program
graduates. The Empowerment Zone employer wage credit provides
an incentive to hire individuals who both live in the zone
and work for a zone business.
Brownfield sites generate little, if any, local tax revenues,
causing area schools and public services to suffer.
When brownfields languish for years, the surrounding neighborhood
erodes as well - a process that can lead to deteriorating
infrastructure and criminal activity, according to a California
Center for Land Recycling report.
The nonprofit Weingart Foundation, which is on the Conservation
Corps' advisory board, refers parolees to the program. Some
parolees have graduated from the program and made careers
of environmental remediation.
By removing toxic substances - even one site at a time - program
graduates are making their neighborhoods safer and more attractive
to businesses.
"By training people to address their local brownfields, we
are not only helping to develop the skills needed to reclaim
this land for the community," former EPA Administrator Christie
Whitman said, "we are also training the next generation of
environmental professionals."
E-mail Joseph_Sorrentino@DailyJournal.com
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