[CPEO-BIF] "Health Centers Find Opportunity in Brownfields"

[Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>]

Health Centers Find Opportunity in Brownfields

By RONDA KAYSEN
New York Times
December 12, 2012

PHILADELPHIA - The community health center rising on a derelict  
corner here in West Philadelphia never would have broken ground if  
not for the asbestos inside the building that was demolished to make  
way for it. Because of the contamination, Spectrum Health Services  
received a $2 million federal cleanup grant, the first piece of a $14  
million construction financing puzzle.

When complete, the 36,000-square-foot building will provide a new  
home for a health center that has been squeezed into a deteriorating  
strip mall nearby for decades. It will also be the latest in a  
nationwide trend to replace contaminated tracts in distressed  
neighborhoods with health centers, in essence taking a potential  
source of health problems for a community and turning it into a place  
for health care. In recent years, health care facilities have been  
built on cleaned-up sites in Florida, Colorado, New Hampshire,  
Minnesota, Oregon and California.

"These health care providers are getting good at it," said Elizabeth  
Schilling, policy manager for Smart Growth America, an advocacy  
group. "They have internalized the idea that this is an opportunity  
for them."

...

For the entire article, see
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/12/realestate/commercial/health- 
centers-find-opportunity-in-brownfields.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

--

Lenny Siegel
Executive Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
a project of the Pacific Studies Center
278-A Hope St., Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650/961-8918 or 650/969-1545
Fax: 650/961-8918
<lsiegel@cpeo.org>
http://www.cpeo.org

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