A new designation will put public and private sector projects in Midtown Kingston at the front of the line for brownfield remediation funds and other state benefits. The announcement Friday that Midtown had won inclusion in the state’s Brownfield Opportunity Area (BOA) program marked the culmination of a three-year planning process conducted by the city working with regional think tank Pattern for Progress.

“The BOA designation gives us additional tools to create and promote equitable redevelopment and neighborhood revitalization,” said Mayor Steve Noble in a statement announcing the designation.

The BOA program administered by the Department of State identifies urban areas with clusters of properties that are vacant, abandoned or underutilized due to contamination and neighborhoods impacted by deindustrialization. Projects in BOAs get priority for various state grants and are eligible for “pre-development” funds to cover expenses like planning and environmental assessment.

Midtown Kingston’s path to the BOA began in 2023 with a $238,000 grant through the state Department of State. The money funded the development of a detailed assessment and plan for a 471-acre area centered on the Broadway corridor that was once home to dozens of manufacturing facilities. The resulting “Midtown Thriving” plan, a collaboration between the city and Pattern for Progress, identified vacant and underutilized properties in the area, identified which held the most potential for redevelopment and gathered input from neighborhood residents about the kinds of development and amenities they would like to see.

“The BOA designation gives us additional tools to create and promote equitable redevelopment and neighborhood revitalization,” said New York Secretary of State Walter T. Mosely in a statement.

The Midtown BOA is Kingston’s second. In 2015 the designation was applied to 192 acres of the Rondout waterfront based on the Hudson Riverport Implementation Plan. That plan includes a wish-list of infrastructure and redevelopment projects intended to complete the Rondout’s pivot from an industrial to a recreational waterfront.