Grant Being Used To Clean Contaminated Site In Tulsa

State and city leaders will soon start removing asbestos from the old Abundant Life building near 17th and Boulder in Tulsa.

It was built in 1957 as the international headquarters of the Oral Roberts Evangelistic Association, but it's been abandoned for nearly 30 years.

This is part of a $2 million effort to clean the property up. Oklahoma's leaders hope it'll help revitalize the area when it's complete.

The Abundant Life building no longer lives up to its name after three decades of decay. The big windowless concrete building is just a few blocks from Riverside Drive.

Several months ago, crews removed the diamonds from the sides for safety reasons, and now, Erin Hatfield with the Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality says the City of Tulsa and the DEQ will clean up the heavy asbestos throughout the seven-story building.

"It's going to be wonderful to be able to do this asbestos remediation, and hopefully get this building ready for reuse," Hatfield said.

The DEQ and City of Tulsa are each using $1,000,000 from their Brownfields Revolving Loan Funds for the project.

Brownfields are areas the EPA considers dangerous and polluted. The two million dollars in grants to clean up the building come from the EPA.

"This large building is in the beginning process of becoming something new and wonderful," Hatfield said.

The owners of the building will have to decide what exactly the building's new purpose will be, but the state said it'll help boost the area around it.

"And adds to job growth, and land values going up in that area, and really adds to the economy there in this part of Tulsa," Hatfield said.

The City of Tulsa sent the following statement on the status of the project:

“The City of Tulsa appreciates the opportunity to partner with the ODEQ to fund the Abundant Life asbestos abatement. This project will enable redevelopment along an important corridor connecting downtown to the RiverParks. In addition, last week EPA announced that it will award supplemental funding for the City's RLF program in the amount of $300,000. As such, we are able to receive applications for additional projects from the redevelopment community."