Learn tips to beautify brownfields at 9/18 Yakima Workshop

Join Ecology and other experts as we dive deep into best practices and the latest trends in brownfield redevelopment, and provide you with tools and insights to advance your land reuse projects.

You can learn more about Ecology's brownfields program on our website.

What will I learn?

The workshop will kick off with a regulatory overview, covering topics from the economics of brownfield reuse, to uses of vacant and underutilized land and buildings, as well as issues unique to agricultural land. Presenters will share successful case studies from Wenatchee and Kittitas County. Ecology and the Washington Department of Commerce will talk about tools and grants to get moving on your brownfields sites.

See the agenda and speakers here.

Other topics include:

• Grants: State and Federal
• Due Diligence and Your Responsibility
• Working with Private Property Owners
• Redeveloping Agricultural Areas and Town Centers
• Public, Private, Non-Profit, Community: How Can You Help?
• Ask the Expert

Who should attend?

• Project Managers (public, private, and nonprofit)
• City Planners
• Construction Managers
• Redevelopment Managers
• Environmental Attorneys
• Practitioners engaged in the acquisition, funding, and development of properties

Register today!

The Brownfields Workshop is Tuesday, Sept. 18, 10 a.m. - 3:30 p.m. at the Yakima Convention Center.

Cleaning Up: Cleanup transforms communities

Visitors enjoy the sunshine at a former Anacortes cleanup site.

Cleaning up pollution remakes our environment and reshapes communities in Washington.

Cleanup improves quality of life. It restores the environment, protects human health, puts people to work, and boosts the economy.

Want a good example? Take a look at the cleanup at the former Scott Paper mill in Anacortes.

The former Scott Paper mill location was identified as a key cleanup site under the Puget Sound Initiative in and around Fidalgo and Padilla bays. The bays have been damaged by historical industrial activities -- cleaning up and protecting these waterways and others is vital to restoring and protecting the Puget Sound ecosystem.

Production meant pollution

The Scott Paper pulp-and-paper mill in Anacortes in full operation.

The mill was a dominant part of manufacturing operations along the Fidalgo Bay shoreline for roughly a century. The mill began as a sawmill, then started operating as a pulp mill to produce paper goods.

Operations shut down in 1978. After that, parts of the site were used for various industrial purposes, including as a log yard, a staging area for oil-field equipment, and an assembly area for modular homes. 

Old lumber littered the shoreline.

All of those activities took their toll on the local environment.

Wood waste suffocated in-water creatures in sediments and littered the shoreline. Industrial chemicals, wood and various pollutants contaminated the soil and sediments.

Over the years, portions of the site were cleaned up. The northern portion of the site, owned by the Port of Anacortes, became a home to commercial and educational buildings.

The site is now a hub for recreational, commercial and educational activities.

They include the Northwest Educational Service District 189 center, the Northwest Center of Excellence for Marine Manufacturing and Technology, and a Northwest Career and Technical Academy campus.

From cleanup to community gem

Wood waste and contaminants were unearthed during cleanup.

The Port of Anacortes, working with Ecology, took on the final cleanup stage in 2009. The work targeted wood waste and contamination along the shoreline and the adjacent uplands.

The project lasted about two years. It was no small task to remove the mill's legacy of pollution -- the Scott Paper cleanup remains the largest such effort (in terms of size and cost) tackled under the Puget Sound Initiative.

Kayakers and a family use the restored beach on a recent day.

This ECOconnect post in May 2011 describes the celebration held at the expanded and upgraded Seafarers' Memorial Park at the mill site.

Now, five years later after cleanup work finished, the former Scott Paper site is in constant use for community gatherings, live music performances, kayaking, boating, and other activities. Residents and visitors stroll the esplanade where old wood lay abandoned.

It's a living, thriving example of how cleanup benefits our communities as well as our environment.



By Seth Preston, Toxics Cleanup Program communications manager

Site on Maury Island recovering from 2004 Crude Oil Spill

by Lisa Copeland, communications manager, Spills program

It’s been eleven years since a significant and devastating crude oil spill occurred in Puget Sound’s Dalco Passage near Tacoma. But if you visited a former fishing port on Maury Island today, you’d probably never know the spill happened.

The October 2004 incident involved ConocoPhillips Co.’s oil tanker Polar Texas, which lost 7,200 gallons of crude oil during evening hours. The unreported spill spread oil out on the water throughout the night and later patches of oily sheen reached as far south as the Tacoma Narrows and as far north as Eagle Harbor.

The sheen touched 15 miles of shore along Colvos Passage, the Narrows and Quartermaster Harbor. Six miles of beach on southern Vashon and Maury islands required cleanup to remove the oil.

In 2010, Conoco Phillips Co. agreed to pay $588,000 to help compensate the public for environmental harm caused by the spill. Reports showed the spill caused harm to Puget Sound Chinook salmon and other salmon species, forage fish, shellfish and their habitats, as well as other bird and wildlife species. Several areas were analyzed, plans were developed and comments were collected. Dockton, an area on Vashon Island and one of three projects proposed by state, federal and tribal governments was selected to receive the restoration funds. King County agreed to manage the project.

The project got underway in 2012 and involved re-grading the Dockton site to re-create a salt marsh wetland. This was done by removing 350 feet of bulkheads to help restore natural shorelines. The project also included taking out boat houses and removing creosote-contaminated pilings and other debris in the intertidal zone.

“After removing the shoreline armoring and fill on the site, the shoreline can act naturally for the first time in over 100 years,” said Greg Rabourn, King County‘s Vashon Basin Steward and project proponent.

Today salmon, forage fish, birds, and shellfish are benefiting from the restoration. And the former village port isn’t just environmentally friendly, it’s beautiful.

Although not part of the restoration, recreational opportunities and public access to the Sound at Dockton Park are abundant and breathtaking. From dog-walking to beach-combing, these bonuses at the site promise something for all ages.

Check out the before and after pictures. Please visit our Flickr site for more photos.