"Shovel-ready" is a term that state and community brownfield offices have been familiar with for years, and landowners have often used the term to attract investment. Today, in light of economic concerns and the need to quickly get community reinvestment projects online, having a project that is shovel-ready, or ready to physically be worked on, is a bonus for any community.

For most states and communities, their practice over the past decade has been to methodically "inventory" brownfields sites and work with property owners to get environmental hazards assessed, characterized and cleaned up. As a result, communities are ready to go with shovel-ready brownfields projects, and now is a good time to get those sites noticed.

In states such as Michigan and Indiana, where a manufacturing and agricultural slowdown and is occurring and a market reinvention phenomenon is taking shape, shovel-ready brownfield sites may very well be the key to building shovel-ready project lists. Why? It's because shovel-ready brownfield sites have the potential to supply the volume of sustainable facilities needed to house these industrial reinventions and reduce operational overhead.

Indiana is one state that could see the impact that brownfields sites readied for redevelopment contribute to their "Shovel-Ready Program." The Shovel-Ready program (www.in.gov/iedc/) started up in 2006 through State legislation that was part of Governor Mel Daniels' jobs agenda. Sites have the opportunity to be certified as shovel-ready by the State's Fast Access Site Team. The review team consists of representatives from the Indiana Economic Development Corporation, Governor's Office, Indiana Dept. of Natural Resources, Indiana Dept. of Environmental Management, Indiana Dept. of Transportation, Indiana State Dept. of Health, Indiana State Dept. of Agriculture and the Indiana State Dept. of Homeland Security.

Application process easy
The application process is relatively simple: Property owners fill out an application, which has a 10-part criterion review, and reads like a list of EPA brownfields grant application requirements. These requirements include: community support, proof of ownership, maps/photos, environmental review, transportation infrastructure, electric, natural gas, and high-speed communication. A letter of support from the local government must also accompany all applications. Hence, local governments are aware of what properties are then shovel-ready, as well as the state.

The shovel-ready environmental review, itself, consists of a check list of information that must be completed to have the property certified: 100-year flood plain, slope and terrain, geologic stability, environmental assessment, air quality, water and mitigated wetlands. The assessments conform to the "all appropriate inquiry" rule and identify that the property has completed a Phase I, any necessary Phase II assessments, presence of institutional or engineering controls and any determination of "No Further Action" from the state.

Opening the floodgates
Currently, Indiana's Shovel-Ready program has 38 sites available for development on their shovel-ready list at this latest round of applications. According to the Shovel-Ready program and Indiana Brownfields program, which helps review the shovel-ready applications, one brownfields site—a former GM plant in Anderson, Indiana—is on that list. Although it is just one site, many others similar sites could be approved if owners were to apply.

Indiana is not alone in recognizing that brownfields sites are and can have the potential to enhance their shovel-ready lists. Other states are suggesting this too, such as Oregon's Shovel Ready Industrial Sites Initiative (established 2004) in which brownfields have been identified as a source of shovel-ready lands. New York (www.shovelready-ny.com) and Pennsylvania (www.pasitesearch.com) also have programs that certify sites as shovel-ready. And their shovel-ready lists, too, are beginning to find growth fueled by brownfields sites.

It appears that brownfields sites are and can be a rich resource for all those state "shovel-ready lists." The legendary conservationist, Aldo Leopold in Sand County Almanac, once characterized the shovel as a tool that gave our ancestors the ability to become givers: they could plant a tree. And once again, the shovel now gives us the symbolic chance to be givers for the environment, but perhaps only if we keep including brownfields sites in our shovel-ready lists.

Kelly S. Novak works within the Planning and Analysis division, USDA Farm Service Agency Conservation & Environmental Programs, Washington, D.C.