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Long Island Redevelopment Institute (LI REDI)
The Long Island Redevelopment Institute (LI REDI) is a nonprofit affiliate of Sustainable Long Island. LI REDI was created to facilitate and implement redevelopment plans that emerge from the visioning processes organized by Sustainable Long Island, especially in communities where market potential has been weakened by existing environmental issues. LI REDI's redevelopment projects are intended to be consistent with the core principles of sustainable development - economic development, environmental health and social equity.
Learn more:
Contact:
Sarah Lansdale, Executive Director
Long Island's Brownfields
It is estimated that there are 6800 potential brownfield sites on Long Island. At the current rate of redevelopment in New York State, it will take 486 years for all of Long Island's brownfields to be cleaned up and redeveloped.
Brownfields on Long Island share some unique characteristics. One is that Long Islanders obtain drinking water from underground aquifers, making cleaning up each site more arduous due to costly contamination remediation efforts. The other is that the majority of Long Island brownfield sites are less than two acres.
Brownfields redevelopment has become an important economic development initiative that utilizes public/private partnerships with the goal of leveraging federal or state funds against private sector investment in revitalizing blighted properties. Not infrequently, however, sites with weak economic potential are left in a blighted state. Because of legal and technical complexities of developing sites with environmental contamination, local governments have difficulty marshalling the resources to tap available grant money and manage projects. Private developers may not devote the dollars and the years to nurture projects where the return on their investment is low and the timelines are long. In some locales, the general public is mistrustful of both government and the development community when it comes to environmental cleanups.
LI REDI's Role
LI REDI is an intermediary in brownfields redevelopment, becoming the cohesive facilitating element that binds the public/private partnership together by acting as:
- An encouraging entity between government and the private development community to initiate brownfields redevelopment projects
- An educational & technical resource for local governments
- A conduit for tapping federal and state sources of brownfields financing
- A neutral forum for educating communities about environmental cleanups
- A pre-developer of brownfields sites to remove obstacles
that prevent private-sector involvement.
Relationship to Sustainable Long Island
LI REDI is a nonprofit affiliate of Sustainable Long Island.
Relationship to the New York Metro Brownfields Redevelopment Fund
LI REDI is one of the organizations that founded the NY Metro Brownfields
Redevelopment Fund. The NY Metro Brownfields Redevelopment Fund
will provide technical assistance, underwriting, environmental insurance
options, and access to the $30 million redevelopment fund.
Projects Eligible for LI REDI Assistance
LI REDI prioritizes projects that promote sustainable development by ranking these
projects against specific criteria to determine the Fund's financing.
Eligibility ranking will also be used to define those projects that
are considered "targeted sites." Criteria for eligibility include:
- The extent to which a local community-based organization
has a substantive role in the project, e.g., marketing, development,
contracting, outreach, end-use planning, design and decision
making, project initiative, visioning, etc.;
- Consistency with an area-wide, community supported plan, if
such a plan exists;
- The extent of a formal or informal partnership between the
developer, the local government and the local community-based
organization(s);
- The extent to which the developer is working in cooperation
with the local government and local community-based organizations;
- The extent to which the project is located in an area characterized
by a concentration of brownfields sites;
- The extent to which the project is located in an area where
there are health concerns;
- The extent to which the project is located in an area where
there are indicators of economic distress, such as low resident
incomes, high unemployment, high commercial vacancy rates, depressed
property values, etc.;
- The extent to which the project site has significant potential
for re-use or redevelopment, including but not limited to mixed
uses, affordable housing, recreation or open space, business
development and job creation;
- The extent to which the project would promote the physical,
economic, environmental, or social revitalization of the area;
- The extent to which the project demonstrates consistency
with socioeconomic factors of the neighborhood. Residential
projects must be reflective of the resident incomes in the neighborhood.
Threshold Screening Criteria
In order to be considered for a loan, the project must meet at least one of the following four types of community development criteria:
1. Affordable Housing - The loan must be made in connection with an affordable housing project for low and moderate-income individuals (even if only part of the project will be affordable).
2. Community Services Targeted to Low- or Moderate-Income Individuals - The loan must be made in connection with the provision of services that include homeownership counseling, healthcare, recreation, community centers, daycare, financial literacy, etc.
3. Small Businesses - The loan must be made for activities that promote economic development by financing small businesses or farms. The loan must benefit low or moderate-income individuals or geographies AND meet size eligibility standards of the Small Business Administration's Development Company or Small Business Investment Company Program or have gross annual revenues of $1 million or less.
4. Stabilization - Activities that revitalize or stabilize low or moderate-income geographies. These activities must have direct and long-term benefits, and may not be in connection with gentrification/displacement.
Projects will not be eligible for LI REDI assistance where the following factors exist:
- Projects which are inconsistent with an existing community plan;
- Where a community plan does not exist, projects where the borrower has not demonstrated broad community acceptance;
- Projects that clearly conflict with adjacent uses;
- Projects where the end use is noxious, such as power plants or waste transfer stations;
- Projects where there has been no community outreach.
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