Investors Get Basic Training at Opportunity Zone ‘Boot Camp’

NEWARK, NJ—A host of entrepreneurs, investors and community officials participated in a “Boot Camp” geared to showcasing resources for Opportunity Zone and brownfield investment in New Jersey last week.

The 2nd National Opportunity Zone Boot Camp and Pitch Competition hosted by BrownfieldListings.com was held at the New Jersey Institute of Technology campus in Newark. The event featured educational sessions that showcased New Jersey’s resources for Opportunity Zone communities and investors and a pitch competition, where participants pitched their ideas to redevelopment experts for a chance to win funding.

“Supporting locally appropriate investment in communities is a critical component of Governor Murphy’s plan to build a stronger, fairer New Jersey economy,” says New Jersey Economic Development Authority CEO Tim Sullivan. “This event was an exciting opportunity to showcase New Jersey’s unmatched suite of resources that bring together investors, developers, and community leaders in Opportunity Zones to connect community-driven projects with the capital that can turn those ideas into reality.”

Organized by national redevelopment ecosystem BrownfieldListings.com in partnership with the New Jersey Innovation Institute, the Opportunity Zone Boot Camp and Pitch Competition featured presentations from leading experts in all disciplines related to Opportunity Zone development, from finance and law to brownfield remediation and community engagement. The event concluded with an open pitch competition that gave community leaders, entrepreneurs, and developers a platform to pitch their projects to a panel of redevelopment experts.

State officials note that New Jersey’s Opportunity Zone strategy is focused on attracting investments in inclusive, equitable development that promote business growth and job creation, especially in communities that have been passed over by developers in the past. The centerpiece of this strategy is the recently-launched Opportunity Zone Marketplace, an online portal designed to connect investors nationwide with business investment, real estate, and community improvement projects in Opportunity Zones.

The Opportunity Zone Marketplace includes a Project Marketplace featuring business and real estate project opportunities, and a network that facilitates connections among investors, developers, local leaders, project sponsors, business and property owners and service providers. Individuals and organizations can join the Statewide Network, as well as Local Networks specific to individual municipalities.

The event also featured NJEDA’s recently-appointed Senior Brownfields Advisor Elizabeth Limbrick, who brings more than two decades of brownfields redevelopment experience to the NJEDA, including posts at the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, academic research on brownfields-related matters and one-on-one technical mentoring for communities at NJIT, and private-sector brownfield management experience.

At the Boot Camp, Limbrick presented her holistic approach to building out the NJEDA’s current brownfields program, which will leverage brownfields to drive economic growth and create thriving and inclusive urban centers and downtowns, with a focus on addressing environmental justice issues and reducing poverty. She highlighted the NJEDA’s enhanced loan program and proposed brownfields redevelopment tax credit that will provide gap funding for brownfield remediation.

Limbrick also discussed the NJEDA’s collaboration with the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection to expand the Community Collaborative Initiative, which embeds DEP staff in targeted cities to provide hands-on support as they coordinate successful remediation and redevelopment projects.