The grants include $1 million divided among several agencies to assess the status of various brownfield sites around Wayne, Oakland, Macomb and Washtenaw counties. A separate $600,000 in a series of three grants was awarded to the City of Ecorse to proceedwith cleanup work and community outreach at the former Great Lakes Steel Mill, which has been vacant since the early 1970s.

Most of the grants provide money to evaluate contaminated properties, while others will fund cleanup work. One involves job training. "EPA's brownfields program puts both property and people back to work," EPA Region 5 acting administrator Bharat Mathur says in a written statement. "The grants we're awarding today to Michigan communities can convert eyesores into engines of economic rebirth."

The largest single grant went to the City of Monroe: $1 million to capitalize a revolving load fund targeting the 45-acre former Consolidated Packaging plant in the Mason Run development area.