Charlie Bartsch was an active board member of VtF from 2008-2018. Charlie was View the Future’s Washington DC connection. No matter how busy he was, he teleconferenced in for Board meetings. He was about to do so on January 17, 2018, when he died just minutes before he was to call in. He worked on most of our projects and his sound reasoning and research were indispensable He was also part of the fabric of Yachats for 30 years visiting as often as he could. He helped build the original Amanda Trail and planted many trees around that trail. He would occasionally work with the Yachats Trails crew when he was visiting. He and we all dreamed of his retirement here and were deeply saddened by his death.
Charlie was Senior Advisor for Economic Development to EPA Assistant Administrator Mathy Stanislaus, charged with promoting inter-agency and public-private financing partnerships to spur land revitalization and site reuse. Among his other duties at EPA, he worked closely with the EPA-DOT-HUD Partnership for Sustainable Communities, advised the Office of Brownfields and Land Revitalization on area-wide planning and auto communities revitalization financing strategies, and had the leading role in developing the agency’s EJ2014 strategy addressing equitable development concerns in environmental justice communities. He also was an EPA point person on the White House “Strong Cities/Strong Communities” recovery initiative, He believed that new initiatives needed to be taken to create new cleaner industries. Working both with EPA and the Commerce Department and under the auspices of the Obama White House, Charlie was Senior Strategist for Communities in Transition at the White House and created the Rural Manufacturing Initiatives, or as President Obama called it, the “Strong Cities/Strong Communities” recovery initiative. This initiative created clean industries and put rural populations back to work including in Washington and Oregon. (Unfortunately, this program was terminated immediately under the Trump Administration.)
Prior to his appointment at EPA, he was Senior Fellow at ICF International, where he served as ICF’s brownfields and smart growth policy expert. Before that, he was Director of Brownfield Studies at the Northeast-Midwest Institute in Washington DC, a public policy center affiliated with the bi-partisan Northeast-Midwest Congressional and Senate Coalitions.
Over the past twenty years before his death, his focus was on brownfield and community redevelopment/reuse strategies and financing, and he is recognized as one of the nation’s leading authorities on these issues. He has provided training and technical assistance support in more than 200 communities in over 40 states. He has written numerous reports and other publications on these issues. Charlie often testified before Congress on issues of economic development, and on HUD brownfield financing innovations and brownfield tax incentives.
Prior to his service at EPA, Charlie was chair of the National Brownfield Association’s Advisory Board, chair of Groundworks USA, and was on the editorial board for the Bureau of National Affairs. In 2001, he received the International Economic Development Council’s Chairman’s Award for Outstanding Service for ten years of work on brownfield policies and legislation. He was called, and still is, “Brownfields’ Guru.”
Additionally, Charlie taught at American University for 22 years in the area of urban policy and planning and environmental studies.
Charlie received his Master’s in Urban Policy and Planning from the University of Illinois-Chicago, and his B.A. in political science from North Central College in Naperville, Illinois.
Charlie left a huge void and will be forever missed by the VtF Board and many members of the Yachats Community. In memory of Charlie, View the Future dedicated a grove of conifers that Charlie helped plant in one area of the Amanda Trail.
