SUN JOURNAL • March 26, 2021
City officials will hold a public hearing Tuesday on a federal grant that will be used to conduct environmental cleanup work at Bates Mill No. 5. The $500,000 Brownfields grant from the EPA, has been a key piece of negotiations and redevelopment planning between the city and developer Tom Platz, who has redeveloped large swaths of the Bates Mill complex. Earlier this month, the city and Platz agreed on a final, five-year agreement toward redeveloping the 350,000-square-foot Mill No. 5, but the city must own the building while environmental remediation is completed. According to previous assessments, the mill contains lead paint, asbestos and PCBs — a group of artificial chemicals that were widely used in electrical equipment — that must be either encapsulated or removed.