Anniston group receives grant from EPA for training initiative

By Ben Cunningham
Star Staff Writer
04-01-2004

An Anniston non-profit group will receive $161,000 from the Environmental Protection Agency to train locals to clean up their community. Sen. Jeff Sessions’ office announced the EPA grant award to the Brownfield Institute on Wednesday. The Brownfield Institute provides low-income western Anniston residents with training in hazardous-waste disposal, heavy-equipment operation and environmental technology. James Hall, president of the Brownfield Institute said the grant will help the group reach its goals of environmental cleanup of polluted industrial sites in western Anniston and of addressing the widespread poverty in the area. The unemployment rate in the area is 14 percent, according to Sessions’ office. “We’re going to train these people and get them off the streets,” Hall said. “We need to get them jobs and get them working.” Anniston Mayor Chip Howell praised the Brownfield Institute and the grant award Wednesday. Howell said training local residents for jobs in environmental cleanup would lend credibility to the effort to clean up sites like those contaminated by the Monsanto chemical plant. “Hopefully with a good pool of trained technicians the contractors will be able to secure their needs locally,” Howell said.

About Ben Cunningham

Ben Cunningham covers education issues and the city of Jacksonville for The Star.