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HomeMy WebLinkAboutAir Quality Advisory Board - Minutes - 03/28/200000-03-\� MINUTES CITY OF FORT COLLINS AIR QUALITY ADVISORY BOARD REGULAR MEETING 281 N. COLLEGE AVE. March 28, 2000 For Reference: Eric Levine, Chair - 229-5225 Scott Mason, Council Liaison 226A824 Brian Woodruff, Staff Liaison - 221-6604 Board Members Present Nancy York, John Schroeer, Eric Levine, Jim Dennison, Harry Edwards, Raymond Sons, Mandar Sunthankar, Linda Stanley, Chris Kavanaugh Board Members Absent None Staff Present Natural Resources Department Brian Woodruff, Terry Klahn, Sarah Fox, Lucinda Smith, and Susie Gordon Transportation Planning_ Susanne Durkin, Ray Moe Guests Jo Birckmayer, Poudre Health Services District Nancy Grove, Larimer County Health Department Doug Ryan, Larimer County Health Department The meeting was called to order at 7:05 Minutes The minutes of the February 22, 2000 meeting were approved as written. Agenda Planning • TransFort Strategic Plan • LUTRAQ initial recommendations to City Council • John Schroeer would like time on the agenda to discuss a possible time/date change for the AQAB meeting. Information will be needed on conference room availability. Short Discussion Items The following items were postponed to the April meeting. • Progress report on LUTRAQ Team, Brian Woodruff • Land Use Code air quality criteria project progress • TDM stakeholder meetings, Nancy York and Chris Kavanaugh Holnam - Air Quality Permit Process — Doug Ryan, Larimer County Health Department Doug told the Board there are two separate, but related, issues with regard to Holnam. The first is the request to the County to burn wood waste. A committee of several community members has been formed to examine the issue. The County has a desire to divert wood waste from the Air Quality Advisory Board March 28, 2000 Page 2 landfill. Secondly, Holnam is applying for a new emissions permit. These items are related because the permit is what will ultimately grant or deny permission to process certain materials in the kiln. Because of changes to the Clean Air Act in 1990, the State asked Holnam to apply for a Title V operating permit. Under this permit the State sets total allowable emissions for all the plant's processes as a whole. This permit will make it easier to determine compliance, and would permit Holnam some degree of operational flexibility without going through permit modifications. The need for flexibility is the reason the State asked Holnam to list the fuels and raw materials they may conceivably use. The State and Holnam are currently negotiating the draft permit language. State staff believes this process will take about two months. Discussion • Levine: My impression is that Jackie Joyce (the State air pollution engineer reviewing Holnam's application) didn't think the application was very rosy, can you speak to that? She was reluctant to talk in detail about the draft permit, certainly the list of fuels, and how they regulate the kiln is an issue for them. • Levine: Are we stuck with federal minimum standards? Can we add standards for pollutants that are different or stricter than the federal standards? The State feels there are some areas in the permit that are discretionary, and some that aren't The community is very interested in the permit. There will be a thirty -day public comment period, and a public hearing can be requested. I'm sure the Air Quality control Commission would grant a hearing. The areas in the permit they felt might be discretionary are .l) monitoring, and 2) the issue of determining what a major fuel is. The EPA has left discretion to states as to what a major fuel change is. A complete stack test is required within ninety days in the event of a major fuel change. A stack test is not required if it is not considered a major change. a Levine: I know the County was negotiating with Holnam on the wood project, but were they aware this type of request was going on? The Larimer County Health Department was aware that Holnam had requested a Title V permit, but not aware of the types of fuels. a Sons: The publicity was that Holnam was requesting permission to burn wood. This is the first I've heard of an open-ended request. At the meeting they indicated they were looking at the feasibility of burning wood waste, but want to have the option of looking at other fuels. 0 York: At the meeting in LaPorte they didn't know which fuels would be economically feasible. They're doing a shotgun approach, listing as many things as they can, so in the future they won't have to go through the hassle of modi�ing the permit. On a motion by Nancy York, the Board voted to recommend that the City Council communicate with Holnam, Inc., requesting that Holnam modify its air quality permit application with respect to alternative fuels, and requesting that Holnam cooperate with community stakeholders in fashioning a mutually agreed upon list of fuels. The vote on the motion was seven in favor, none opposed, and two abstaining — Jim Dennison and Chris Kavanaugh. Linda Stanley said she feels it's important to stay on top of this issue given what is not known about hazardous fuels and what they do. Tobacco Education —Jo Birckmayer, Poudre Health Services District and Sarah Fox, NRD Fox told the board she has kept John Fischbach updated regarding progress on the smoking ordinance. A lot of effort has been put into developing a public outreach process, because it's Air Quality Advisory Board March 28, 2000 Page 3 very important to have a good plan to reach as many people as possible. The City is hoping to team up with the Poudre Health Services District in this effort. Jo Birckmayer discussed the Poudre Health Services District and issues around tobacco use interventions. The Poudre Health Services District has identified tobacco use in the community as a priority. Smoking rates have a large health impact in the community. They are extremely concerned about the increase in the number of kids who are smoking. There had been a drop in smoking in the last ten years, but now the rates among kids are going back up. It is not known for sure what causes the increase, but peer pressure and advertising are very persuasive. Harry Edwards asked if there is any information regarding smoking rates in communities where there is an anti -smoking ordinance. Birckmayer responded that the rates in California have decreased, but that California is very aggressive, and it may not be possible to sort out how much that one activity impacted the results. Levine requested information about what actions California has taken. Birckmayer will pull those reports from the Colorado Strategic Plan and forward them for distribution to the board. Mason Street Corridor transit -mode selection — Susanne Durkin, Ray Moe Durkin provided a brief summary of the process ongoing for the past several months. She explained selection criteria and how different options were rated in terms of design, modeling and surveys. They will be going to Council on Tuesday to ask them to pick the transit option, and then proceed with the final design, followed by implementation of Phase 1 of the project. A lot of folks would like to see the light rail option, but due to cost it may not be the best choice for Phase 1. Ray Moe said the lead team selected evaluation criteria to compare the different options, including air quality, noise and visual impacts. Three options were evaluated: 1) Bike/Ped & Busway, 2) Bike/Ped & Rail, and 3) Bike/Ped & Elevated. The overall consensus favored the busway option. Discussion • Levine: I was disappointed to read that light rail is not an option. We would proceed with rail tf we had support from Council. The beauty of the plan is that it's not a big problem to convert from busway to rail at some future time. • In other communities there are efforts going into improving the ambiance of buses, such as platform stations and higher quality buses. There will be a very distinct difference between the run-of-the-mill TransFort buses and corridor buses. • Levine: What is the time frame? Once the Phase I master plan is adopted implementation could proceed at the same time we're planning Phase 2, which is the construction of the bike/pedestrian path from Prospect to Harmony. We could see transit by 2005 if we get lucky. Durkin said the Lead Team wants the buses to be the least -polluting possible. They're looking at $350,000 per bus instead of $250,000. Staff and the consultants have said there won't be any compromise on that issue. No one has questioned that decision so far. Air Quality Advisory Board March 28, 2000 Page 4 York: On the West Coast they have buses that people can actually carry their bikes onto. That's a great point, and any transit center would have bicycle facilities as well. Edwards: I'm having a great deal of difficulty understanding the presentation on page 26. I not sure what it means, or what the air quality component of this study revealed. When the option is selected we can do more hard analysis on the environmental component. On a motion by Linda Stanley, the Board voted unanimously to recommend that the City Council select the dedicated-busway option for Mason Street Corridor, as recommended by the advisory team and the lead team, with three stipulation: 1) that the buses would be as emission -free as possible, using the best available technology; (2) that the future use of light rail would not be precluded in any way, and (3) that the buses would be able to accommodate bicycles on board. _Review Council six-month planning calendar April 25 — Campus West Subarea Plan — Woodruff said he and the chair had dropped it from agenda planning, since it is only an exploration of what could be accomplished, very minimal at this time, with zero air quality impacts. May 2 — New Urban Street Standards May 9 — TransFort Strategic Plan Harry Edwards asked when Council would address the smoking ordinance. Sarah Fox said it should go to the Health and Safety Committee by the end of the summer. Edwards said the Board is very interested in this issue and encouraged the chair to get the item on the agenda to j debate and discuss it in a timely manner. Woodruff suggested the Board could review the public outreach plan at its June meeting. Nancy York wondered if it would be appropriate to entertain a motion recommending the Performing Arts Center and new library sites be located near transit and existing parking. Staff will check into the time frame for this, and report to the chair. Adjournment The meeting adjourned at 9:33.