SoCal Air Agency Delays Taking Action on Critical Pollution Vote

Last week, I told you about an important decision the South Coast Air Quality Management District heard relating to air pollution credits to be doled out to polluters in the Los Angeles region.  The public hearing took place last Friday in a very explosive manner, stressing the already strained emotions on both sides of the issue. 

For the past several years, tensions have flared over the issue of pollution credit issuing in the Los Angeles region, which has resulted in two prior lawsuits where community and environmental advocates have won.  However, the air district was successful in securing a last minute legislative pass that allowed them to continue issuing pollution credits that many local advocates considered invalid. Which brings us to what happened on Friday. Here is a quick recap of how the hearing went:

The District stacked the cards, so those opposing the decision to create a large amount of pollution credits would speak first, allowing the primarily small and big business supporters the final hour or more of testimony.  Setting the tone for the rest of the hearing, Chairman Burke argued with several community advocates over the accuracy of a statement about Board member accessibility prior to the hearing.  This comment spurred intense debate amongst the Board members and the public about an entirely irrelevant matter: which Board members were contacted when prior to the hearing.  The Board members appeared to be critical of the opponents of the action they were about to take.   

I have never been to a public hearing where public officials critiqued advocates for their pre-hearing strategy, criticized them for not coming to various meetings sooner (despite the extensive comments advocates submitted before the hearing and YEARS of advocacy on this issue), and overall just spent so much time on an issue that was not central to the decision to be made.  Also, regardless of whether the critiques of our strategies had merit, it detracted from the real, crucial, and important discussions that needed to happen.  Moreover, because of this unnecessary badgering of community advocates, many of the younger folks at the hearing actually became too intimidated to testify for fear of finding themselves in a public verbal sparring match with Board members three to four times their age.  It is unfortunate that this was the introduction to public participation for many of them and not the way the vast majority of public hearings are held.      

In the end, when the critique over who contacted whom was over, Chairman Burke noted that he is just trying to “ascertain the facts.”  That was a refreshing segueway into the actual substance of the decision, which had been derailed to that point.  So, Chairman Burke, let’s ascertain the facts.  Here they are:   

Fact 1: This is an important decision for public health in the region.  The socioeconomic report estimates the impacts from distributing the pollution credits to be $1.2 billion.  According to the environmental document's analysis, the health impacts from this proposal are huge with more than 100 and possibly 200 premature deaths possible from increased air pollution in the region. 

Fact 2: The California Environmental Quality Act requires that when there is an environmentally superior alternative that achieves the objectives of the project’s needs and purpose, the agency must choose that alternative.  There is such an option, which is called Option D. The Board has yet to decide whether it, based on the staff’s recommendation, instead prefers the option that results in many more premature deaths.

Fact 3: The record shows that the District does not need to make the drastic decision it wants to take, which will create thousands of pounds of pollution credits by stealing reductions in pollution from the past.   Instead, Option D will result in more than a hundred lives saved, while simultaneously allowing the District to have credits to provide to businesses big and small (but mostly big—like oil companies), hospitals, and prisons. In reading the fine print, the place that important information goes to die, one would realize Alternative D will give the region what it needs according the District’s own calculations and arguments for the project.

In the end, the real question is whether the District will make the correct, lawful decision.  Or, will it let the animus over the gall of environmentalists and community advocates who challenged the agency’s unlawful conduct get the best of them.

I understand that this issue is emotionally charged, and there is a desire not to listen to the community and environmental advocates who have worked for years on this issue.  At the same time, I am happy that we have laws in place to steer the District in the right direction, and I hope cooler heads will prevail and chose the environmentally superior alternative that gets the job done.