Former Brooklyn School Site Redevelopment
2014 Small Community Impact Award Winner
Location: 15th and 16th Ave E, Hibbing, MN
Nominated by: North St. Louis County Habitat for Humanity
The Brooklyn School project transformed a contaminated, vacant city block located in Hibbing, Minnesota, into $960,000 worth of affordable, single-family homes. The project reclaimed a blighted area of Hibbing’s Brooklyn neighborhood and filled a critical need for affordable housing options in St. Louis County (currently ranked 79th among Minnesota’s 87 counties for availability of affordable housing). The development provides homes for 28 to 30 new residents to help revitalize a small city that has been affected by a declining population as well as wages, employment, and education that are lower than state-wide medians.
When the former Brooklyn school was destroyed by fire in 1973, its charred remains were buried on site, resulting in the contamination of soils and debris with lead, other metals, and asbestos. The school was never reopened, and the site remained vacant until it was donated to North St. Louis County Habitat for Humanity in 2008.
Barr Engineering Co. helped North St. Louis County Habitat for Humanity to understand the process of brownfield redevelopment and secure funding to assess, delineate, and remediate the contaminated soils and debris. Critical financial support was provided by the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development and the Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board. The City of Hibbing provided grant administration services and building inspection. These financial partnerships were critical to the success of a project in a location that lacks the market drivers typically associated with brownfield redevelopment (such as large resident populations and high traffic counts), especially for affordable housing projects.
The environmental assessment and cleanup took three years. Impacted media were investigated and characterized according to contaminant type and concentration to minimize disposal costs. Four categories of waste materials were identified allowing for careful chemical characterization and segregation of wastes. This led to environmental cost savings of hundreds of thousands of dollars by both minimizing the volume of costly waste requiring off-site disposal and reusing those soils that were below SRVs. Overall, the environmental assessment and remediation project cost $465,000.
The project was ready for redevelopment when environmental assurance letters were received from the MPCA in May 2012. To date, $850,000 has been spent to develop six single family homes. Another home is currently under construction, and an eighth home is planned for 2015.
Project Financing:
- Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development
- Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board
- City of Hibbing
Project Partners:
- North Saint Louis County Habitat for Humanity
- Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development
- Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board
- City of Hibbing
- Minnesota Pollution Control Agency
- Barr Engineering
- Belair Excavating
- Architectural Resources, Inc.
- Bougalis and Sons Construction