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HomeMy WebLinkAboutAIR QUALITY ADVISORY BOARD - MINUTES - 01/27/20251 1/27/2025 - Minutes Air Quality Advisory Board REGULAR MEETING Monday, January 27, 2025 – 5:30 PM 222 Laporte Avenue, Colorado River Room 1. CALL TO ORDER: 5:36 PM 2. ROLL CALL ● Board Members Present – • Dan Welsh (Chair) • Mark Houdashelt (Vice Chair) • Adam Schmidt • Michael Cheeseman • Jeremiah Gorske • Michael Johnson • Matt Ayres • Maria Moore ● Board Members Absent – • None ● Staff Members Present – • Selina Lujan de Albers, Staff Liaison • Micah Warners, Environmental Services Education & Outreach Senior Specialist ● Guest(s) – • None 3. AGENDA REVIEW No changes. 4. PUBLIC PARTICIPATION Chair Welsh discussed an email that was sent by Roxanne Griffin who is advocating for not using single-use plastic water bottles and is appealing to the Board to discontinue their use at Board meetings. He stated he does not believe the issue falls under the specific targeted goals of the Air Quality Advisory Board but stated he would respond to Griffin thanking her for her input. 5. APPROVAL OF MINUTES – DECEMBER 2024 Members discussed changes to the minutes. Vice Chair Houdashelt made a motion, seconded by Schmidt, to approve the minutes of the December 2024 meeting as amended. The motion was adopted unanimously. 2 1/27/2025 - Minutes 6. PREVIOUS BUSINESS Vice Chair Houdashelt commented on the recommendation sent to Council by the Board regarding the Building Performance Standards (BPS). He noted that Council discussed the topic and that the Chamber of Commerce was opposed to the program as it did not have a high enough return on investment. Vice Chair Houdashelt stated Council opted to do a pilot project involving three to five buildings due to concerns about impacts on building owners. The results of the pilot project will be discussed at a summer work session and a decision will be made about BPS prior to the seating of the new Council in January. Additionally, Council asked the BPS staff to develop a customer journey map, which is a document that describes exactly what building owners would need to do to achieve the program targets. 7. NEW BUSINESS a. Air Quality Education Collaboration Presentation – Micah Warners, Education & Outreach Senior Specialist for the Environmental Services Department Lujan de Albers introduced Micah Warners, the new Education and Outreach Senior Specialist and briefly discussed his role with the City. Warners discussed his history in education and his new role with Environmental Services. He outlined his goals for this meeting: to share and learn about goals for air quality education in 2025, to begin exploring ideas for potential collaboration, and to gather feedback which will be used to consider future collaboration opportunities between the Board and the Environmental Services Department. Members discussed their goals for the meeting, including discussing opportunities to improve public responses to wildfire impacts; discussing how the CSU campus can help educate the public as well and be more involved in local government; discussing how the Board and its members can be a face of air quality issues; determining what the Board’s role is in terms of education; discussing staff’s plans to perform, supplement, and increase outreach and education opportunities, and how Board members can help to support and promote those opportunities; discussing successes and failures of previous outreach efforts, particularly with schools; sharing the 2025 AQAB Work Plan priorities; and determining areas of collaboration. Warners discussed the education and outreach goals of the Environmental Services Department, including increased community awareness, understanding, and pro-environmental behaviors in the areas of air quality, waste diversion, and climate action and resilience, and improving understanding of the audiences to better connect with them educationally. Warners outlined the strategy focuses, including leveraging people and aligning the messaging. Warners summarized the seasonal air quality education topics, including 3 1/27/2025 - Minutes radon, air quality index and ozone, wildfire smoke, and residential wood burning. He discussed past education and outreach tactics, including flyers, social media, websites, newsletters, advertisements, guidance documents, videos, and events. Chair Welsh commented on an exhibit showing artwork of an artist who utilizes environmental themes and noted the artist will be giving a lecture on February 27th. Members discussed their goals for community air quality education, including increasing awareness and changing behaviors related to electrification, gas stoves, and lawn and garden equipment, among others. In terms of tangible actions, members discussed items such as messaging targeted at specific audiences affected by a particular aspect of air quality; designing a school AQ monitoring curriculum; air quality installations in high traffic areas; events; a Coloradoan article on the CDPHE air quality tools; targeted social media advertising; utility bill advertising; and utilizing flags to indicate air quality. Members and staff discussed the ways in which the Board can work with the Environmental Services Department to support applicable events. Warners stated he would return to the Board after analyzing the information to discuss details around actual education and outreach events or tasks. Chair Welsh noted the first week of May is Air Quality Awareness Week and it was noted that February 14th is Winter Bike to Work Day. Members discussed the possibility of forming an education subcommittee to work with Warners. b. Agenda Planning and 2024 Annual Report Review Chair Welsh noted Vice Chair Houdashelt compiled the 2024 Annual Report listing meeting topics and speakers, and the Board reviewed the report. 8. OTHER BUSINESS Chair Welsh stated Poudre Fire Authority has been invited to provide information on the community wildfire protection plan as aspects of the plan relate to air quality and wildfire preparedness. Additionally, Matt Tribby, a former AQAB member and Senior Air Quality Engineer for PRPA, has offered to provide a presentation regarding PRPA’s decision-making process related to its new turbine project. It was noted that the project has yet to be permitted by Larimer County. Members discussed future meeting topics and Chair Welsh stated he would call Matt Tribby to see if he could speak at the February meeting. Lujan de Albers noted Honore Depew, the NRAB liaison, gave a presentation on the Our Climate Future strategic refresh to his Board and noted the AQAB may also want to hear that presentation. Schmidt clarified the Board is no longer seeking to change City Code to allow for 4 1/27/2025 - Minutes the Board to conduct education and outreach. Members concurred. a. Board Member Reports Vice Chair Houdashelt announced the Transportation Projects Fair at the Lincoln Center on March 6th. Additionally, he stated he is representing the Fort Collins Sustainability Group on a City advisory group for the development of zero carbon building codes to be implemented by 2030. Members discussed recent sweeping changes to various federal entities with the new administration. b. Six Month Calendar Review c. Revisit Action Items from Previous Meetings and Preview of Next Meeting 9. ADJOURNMENT ● 8:00 pm Minutes approved by a vote of the Board on 2/24/2025