BAD Buildings Program Provides Momentum for Eight W.Va. Communities

The Northern West Virginia Brownfields Assistance Center at West Virginia University has awarded eight West Virginia communities with technical assistance grants.

The grants, valued at $10,000 each, are made available through the Brownfields Center’s BAD (Brownfields, Abandoned, Dilapidated) Buildings Program and will enable the grant recipients to address barriers to the reuse and redevelopment of abandoned and dilapidated buildings within their communities.

The 2014 BAD Buildings Program technical assistance grant winners include the following communities:

• Town of Weston

• Middleway Conservancy Association, Inc.

• City of Kenova

• City of Shinnston

• City of Fairmont

• City of Point Pleasant

• Downtown Wheeling, Inc.

• City of Ronceverte

“The BAD Buildings Program allows the Northern West Virginia Brownfields Assistance Center to provide technical assistance and expertise to these communities to identify and research their abandoned buildings as well as create redevelopment plans and overcome major obstacles in turning these problem properties into community resources,” said Luke Elser, BAD Buildings Program Manager at WVU. “All of the work will be done in collaboration between local elected officials and community volunteers – everyone will have a voice at the table because everyone is being impacted by these abandoned and dilapidated properties.”

Funding for the BAD Buildings Program is being provided by the Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation through the WVU Foundation.

For more information about the BAD Buildings Program or the Northern West Virgnia Brownfields Assistance Center, visit www.wvbrownfields.org. The Northern West Virginia Brownfields Assistance Center is a program of the West Virginia Water Research Institute, located at WVU’s National Research Center for Coal & Energy.