Editor's note: This story is part of Southwest Michigan Second Wave's On the Ground Battle Creek series.
CALHOUN COUNTY, MI — Vacant or underutilized parcels of land and properties in Calhoun County could become developable again through a $1.5 million grant from the United States
Environmental Protection Agency.
Originally announced in October, 2024, the grant was frozen in early 2025 for a short period and became available in February, says Krista Trout-Edwards, Executive Director of the
Calhoun County Land Bank (CCLB),
which was awarded the funding along with its coalition partners, the
City of Albion and the
Battle Creek Community Foundation.
“The EPA requires that we pick target areas, per their requirement, Calhoun County also is included, and the Land Bank brings that in as a countywide location,” she says. “We are also required to have a nonprofit partner involved.”
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Courtesy: Calhoun County Land BankBCCF is that nonprofit coalition partner and was selected by the CCLB prior to the submission of the grant application, says Elizabeth Schultheiss, Vice President of Fund Administration and Development for BCCF.
“This was based on two factors: the first being the long-standing relationship our two organizations have enjoyed, including past success working on EPA grant initiatives together; and the second being, the EPA requires multiple stakeholders be part of the grant application and distribution process if funds are awarded, to ensure a cross-section of community voices are at the table,” she says.
The CCLB owns just over 700 properties and parcels.
“Grant funds will be used to inventory and prioritize sites and conduct 37 Phase I and 32 Phase II environmental site assessments, says information on the EPA’s website.
“Grant funds also will be used to develop 13 cleanup plans. Assessment activities will focus on the southeast and northwest neighborhoods within the City of Battle Creek and the western portion of the City of Albion.”
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Courtesy: Calhoun County Land BankTrout-Edwards says the majority of the CCLB’s inventory is concentrated in Battle Creek and Albion.
“Any Land Bank-owned property is automatically a Brownfield property,” she says. “For some sites in Albion, there are some boundaries on them, and no remediation has been done. We have data on many of these properties.”
The grant falls under the EPA's Brownfields Program, which “empowers states, communities, and other stakeholders to work together to prevent, assess, safely clean up, and sustainably reuse brownfield sites. A brownfield site is real property, the expansion, redevelopment, or reuse of which may be complicated by the presence or potential presence of a hazardous substance, pollutant, or contaminant.”
Partnerships at work
The CCLB has been working for several years with the City of Albion to acquire properties and identify properties that could be remediated, says Doug Terry, Albion City Manager.
Some of these properties contain contaminants like mercury or concentrated levels of different metals or byproducts of metals, which were used in casting metals at industrial foundries that have since closed, he says.
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Courtesy: Calhoun County Land Bank“The Land Bank’s core mission is to acquire properties that have been abandoned or vacated, and what ended up happening is over time some of these properties, especially the ones used in industrial foundries, had residuals of castings in the dirt,” Terry says. “This contaminated soil was used as infill in the city, and what ended up happening is properties became contaminated.”
At the time that contaminants like this were being disposed of and leaching into the soil, he says, people weren’t aware of the future damage that would be done.
Following World War II, the U.S. experienced a vast increase in throw-away packaging: cans, bottles, plastics, and paper products — and the introduction into the marketplace of thousands of new synthetic organic chemicals. As a result of this deluge of waste land toxic materials, the earth's automatic, self-cleansing, life support systems became increasingly threatened. In the 1960s, this became a concern and led to the creation of the EPA in 1970.
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Courtesy: Calhoun County Land BankIn the mid-1990s, the EPA began providing seed money to local governments to launch hundreds of two-year pilot projects and developed guidance and tools for the cleanup and redevelopment of brownfield sites, according to information on its
website.
Dedicated efforts to remediate identified properties in Albion has been on the radar of the city and the CCLB for many years, Terry says.
“What this grant will do is give us a better idea of the extent of contamination,” he says. “Once we identify that, a plan will be put in place to reuse the property with limited use or remediate the properties if it has a serious effect on people’s quality of life in the city.”
Remediation leads to renewal
The 2024 grant is the third EPA grant awarded to the CCLB. Trout-Edwards says the EPA funding is crucial to getting land redevelopment ready.
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Courtesy: Calhoun County Land Bank“Our consultants can help communities and developers with project planning and identifying what assessments need to be done,” she says. “This pre-development work gives us a better knowledge base so we can better market them.”
This work also alleviates some of the financial burden of costly but important testing for developers and business owners who are considering brownfield site revitalization, Schultheiss says.
“The testing eliminates uncertainty around potential remediation needs, clearing the way for properties to be transformed into productive spaces that benefit those living and working in the surrounding areas of the community,” she says.
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Courtesy: Calhoun County Land BankThe grant, which goes through September 2028, will focus on properties in and around Battle Creek and Albion, but is available throughout Calhoun County, particularly those poised for future development but requiring environmental review and planning to proceed, says a press release from the CCLB.
“Some communities may not have a baseline knowledge of the properties,” Trout-Edwards says, adding that this information is critical to future residential or commercial development efforts.
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Courtesy: Calhoun County Land BankWhile there is reason to be optimistic about future development on these properties, Trout-Edwards cautions that it does take time for projects to come to fruition.
The need for additional residential options is top of mind for stakeholders throughout Calhoun County who site housing that will be needed for some 1,700 employees who will be working at Ford Motor Co.
BlueOval Battery Park in Marshall.
“There is a tremendous need for housing,” Terry says.
Schultheiss says housing and economic development are important focus areas for BCCF, which envisions a community where programs, policies, and practices increase collaboration, connection, and reciprocity between different stakeholders, so that development projects generate livable communities for all residents to live in, including safe, stable, and affordable housing.
“Housing has been a critical community need for several years,” she says. “However, the Blue Oval project does amplify the need.”
BCCF is a member of a housing roundtable group that meets quarterly and the City of Battle Creek’s Housing and Community Development Steering Committee. Schultheiss says the Foundation recently established the Safe and Secure Housing and Transportation endowment fund to raise funds and awareness to help ensure that all greater Battle Creek area residents have access to social drivers of environmental health and safety where they live.
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Courtesy: Courtesy: Calhoun County Land Bank311 Michigan Ave. W “These include access to safe shelter, affordable housing, transitional/ supportive housing, utility assistance, emergency home repairs, rental and eviction supports, and affordable, safe transportation,” she says.
Initiatives like this come alongside the efforts funded through the grant. Trout-Edwards says stability and support are crucial to the success of ongoing relationships with developers looking to breathe new life into vacant properties.
While she says that funding will remain a challenge, she says the CCLB continues to make significant efforts, including the purchase of house designs.
“We are certainly working on making sure our sites are redevelopment-ready,” Trout-Edwards says. “I feel good about some of the steps we’ve made and the information we have. The cost to build and making sure it’s affordable for folks, that’s important to us.”