Kent Gets $1.3 Million State Grant for RB&W Property

The state has awarded Kent a $1.34 million grant to finishing cleaning the former RB&W brown field on Mogadore Road and prepare it for redevelopment.

Kent Mayor Jerry Fiala and Kent Economic Development Director Dan Smith traveled to Columbus today for the Clean Ohio Fund Brownfield Revitalization Program hearing on the request and shared the news on their drive back.

"The sun is shining on us down here in Columbus," Fiala said.

Smith said the grant award triggers with the property's owner, Thomas & Betts Corp. of Memphis, TN, which will now sell the property at 800 Mogadore Road to Kent for $1.

"They fully funded our request, so we’ll move pretty quickly to get this property cleaned up and hopefully land some of the tech companies for the ," Smith said. "This does trigger the terms that we agreed to."

The city plans to work with and the Kent Regional Business Alliance to use the property for a technology incubator corridor.

What comes next is a "failure investigation" to find the cause of at the 18-acre site. Both the city and Thomas and Betts agreed to spend up to $75,000 each to pay for the failure investigation, which the state said could not be covered by the grant.

The investigation will focus on an underground, clay slurry wall that surrounds about 2 acres at the southern end of the property where former open-air oil lagoons were used by former businesses there.

Officials involved in the project, including at the Ohio EPA and the property owner's environmental consultant, Mentor-based Hzw Environmental Consultants, have suspected the slurry wall for months to be the cause of the contaminant increase.

"We’ll move immediately to do the failure investigation," Smith said. "We’ll be talking to them Monday morning to get started."

Matt Knecht, president of Mentor-based HzW, said the failure investigation of the slurry wall will focus on three possible causes. Knecht said the investigation will determine: if the wall itself is leaking where an underground sanitary sewer line crosses through the 2-acre area; if an artificial cap covering the contaminated acreage is allowing water in or out; or if the wall wasn't built deep enough during its installation in 2005 to link up with an existing clay base below the contaminated soil.

The bulk of the state grant, as much as $925,000, will pay to fix the cause of the chemical leaching and remove any remaining contaminated soil.

Fiala credited Smith and other city staff members for putting in hours of work to apply for and receive the state grant.

"The bottom line is, once again we’re going to stimulate economic development and promote jobs, which will strengthen the tax base for the city of Kent," he said. "I’m extremely proud of our staff for getting this done."

Smith said the 17.7 acre site is a perfect example of what the grant was designed for.

"It will take what was an extremely useful piece of land over the past 100 years and make it a useful piece of land for the next 100 years," he said.

Scroll down for past coverage on Kent Patch about the property.

• Update: City Will Pay to Diagnose Problem at RB&W Site
• Public Meeting held on City's $1.5 Million 'Clean Ohio' Request
• Public Meeting on $1.5 Million RB&W Clean-Up is Wednesday
• Owner: RB&W Containment System Has Failed
• Kent Asks State for $1.5 Million to Finish RB&W Site Cleanup
• Council Votes to Buy Former RB&W Site on Mogadore Road
• City May Buy Former RB&W Site on Mogadore Road
• Former RB&W Site Closer to Clean, But Leaching Still a Concern
• Lamson & Sessions More Than Just Tainted Soil
• Shining a Light on One of Kent's Oldest Brownfields
• A Dirty History of Manufacturing at old Lamson and Sessions, RB&W Site
• EPA: No Link Between Demolition, Contaminant Breach at RB&W Site
• Under VAP, Companies Oversee Own Chemical Cleanups
• EPA Concerned Former RB&W Site Leaching Contaminants Through Soil