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HomeMy WebLinkAboutAir Quality Advisory Board - Minutes - 09/18/20033 -0� MINUTES CITY OF FORT COLLINS AIR QUALITY ADVISORY BOARD REGULAR MEETING 281 N. COLLEGE AVE. September 18, 2003 For Reference: Linda Stanley, Chair - 493-7225 Eric Hamrick, Council Liaison 226-4824 Sarah Fox, Staff Liaison 221-6312 Board Members Present Nancy York, Jim Dennison, Linda Stanley, Katie Walters, Cherie Trine, Ken Moore, Everett Bacon Board Members Absent John Long, Mandar Sunthankar, Staff Present Natural Resources Department: Lucinda Smith, Terry Klahn, Melissa Moran, Zoe Shark Transportation: Tom Frazier, Marlys Sinner Guests None The meeting was called to order at 5:10 p.m. Minutes The minutes of the August 21, 2003 meeting were unanimously approved as written. Air Quality Communication Plan Lucinda Smith introduced Melissa Moran to the board. Moran said that in early October there will be focus groups. We want to find out what motivates the public. • Bacon: It seems like we're spending time on how to get the message out. The message is what's important. Energy Star makes sense, but there are a lot of messages that don't. Like, turning off your PC. I can't make the connection between my PC and air quality. • Stanley: What about using local perspectives. How do we get the point across? Personal obligation and small changes are the beginnings of the message. • Moran: It's based on actions, and the results of actions. We need to identify where people are in the process of understanding air quality issues. • Trine: I don't think people are motivated by the Good Samaritan things. Take a lesson from the Health Dept on West Nile Virus and use a scare campaign. • Walters: Something that motivates everyone is money. People don't realize where they can save money. There are things they should be doing at home. • Trine: How about idling in traffic, tell them how many brain cells are dying. • Bacon: That's what makes this a challenge. You're talking about people who spend $800 a year on Starbucks coffee. People don't perceive bad air quality here. People who have respiratory problems are more aware. Air Quality Advisory Board 09/18/2003 Page 2 of 6 • Stanley: Make it personal somehow. • Dennison: This whole debate shows that different people will react to different aspects. -Some people will be motivated by emotional cues, others by scientific data, others, health or visibility. That's where a focus group will help. There's not one single strategy. • Trine: What about getting the mayor to write an article? • Smith: Or, the.CSU football coach. • Stanley: We have so many messages coming at us every day. People tune things out. It's going to take more than just putting information in the utility bills. It will have to be splashy and emotional. It's hard to get people to engage the left brain. There's got to be a lot of right brain processing that goes on in those ads. I hate the newspaper ads, there's no reason to notice them. • Trine: There are major things that bother people. In my neighborhood it's idling, and wood smoke. • Walters: There are a lot of people who notice the brown cloud, however none of them have beard the message from Fort Collins. No one "stops at the click". There are things that are so simple that Denver has done. But the message is not getting across. • Dennison: I wonder if there are any places that have a marketing campaign they thought worked. • Walters: At the focus groups you're going to get people who are already concerned. • Moran: That's part of the design element of soliciting individuals. It does not identify that this is an air quality issue. We're trying to get a representative sample of all people who live in Fort Collins. Maybe coming out of the focus group we'll be better able to identify our audience. • Smith: Maybe we could do some of both. • York: You should say air quality and health impacts. I get information from the American Lung Association. When they're soliciting for money I'm inclined to give them more when they provide factual information about the health impacts of air quality. Latimer County has a high rate of lung disease. We should hire the ads on the back of buses so that people have it right in their face. I'm so worried because people idle around me all of the time. We need a "thank you for not idling" campaign, and connecting the health and financial impacts. Money is also in health care. Everyone understands money. • Moore: When you try to justify the high cost of emissions related failures to the consumer, you can't say "because it's going to clean up the air', you have to say, 'your car will perform better, and by the way, it's going to clean up the air". You've got to point out the good and positive things that are more dollar related. • Trine: Latimer County is also high in birth defects. There are a whole host of problems that are possible. We need to get people thinking about their own lives, including birth defects. • Bacon: The air quality solution in on the back of government. That's my personal feeling. The single biggest impediment I see is fleet turnover. When I moved to Colorado and saw what it would take to register my vehicle I decided never to buy a new vehicle again. The single most important thing government can do is make fees more conducive to turning cars over. • Stanley: Always buying new cars isn't good for the environment either. • Moran: One of the four air quality team members feels strongly about our_small changes. But we feel like if we start awareness on a small level, folks might pay more attention, and be Air Quality Advisory Board 09/18/2003 Page 3 of 6 more politically active. This is a start to try to get something that makes a bigger impact. We want to encourage citizens to open their eyes to stuff they know about. • Smith: Encouraging both small and large actions is still on the table. • Moore: There are conflicting messages. You get a message from the State that the air is clean and we don't need the UM program, and here's the City of Fort Collins saying we still need to do more to clean up our air. That's another challenge you're facing as well. • Dennison: Are you asking the question of if the money we're spending on the marketing of individual choices could be better spent with the City pursuing other forms of action, such as legislation? • Bacon: I do think awareness is important. • Dennison: We have a City with limited resources. We have to employ them wisely. There are things the City could pursue at the legislative level in Denver. I want to urge that as a board we find a way to advise Council to make sure they don't forget to do those things. • York: You should make the Transportation Board one of your focus groups, or at least get their input. There's no question they make the connection. • Stanley: It would be good to take in ideas for people to respond to, rather than have them come up with things off the top of their heads. I don't have a lot of faith in campaigns. I don't think they work very well unless you have an extremely compelling message. I can see a benefit in awareness, and community readiness. I don't have a problem with future action that might be legislative. I would like to see how much money is being spent, and where it's being allocated. • Stanley: Last night the NRAB had a thing on the budget. This handout shows how much is budgeted and spent on the clean air programs. It's nice to keep people employed, but they're not making much progress. If I was on City Council I'd havea lot of questions. It concerns me how the money is spent. Are we getting what we can? I would like to see some justification. • Smith: Of staff, and what the program accomplishes? • Stanley: How time is spent, is it having any effect. • Moran: I'm curious about feelings toward providing incentives to people to make changes. What would your feelings be if we put marketing money into a rebate program? • Trine: It motivates me. • Bacon: They seem very expensive. And it seems like you need to find the biggest vehicle for the buck. I hate to sound like I don't care, but it doesn't seem like it has the biggest bang for the buck. • Moran: Think about it at the point of purchase. They're ready to make a purchase, and they have the option of an Energy Star, or a non Energy Star that's less expensive. That is the time where you can change behavior. • Walters: If you're going to do point of sale it needs to be very informative. It needs to be spelled out. There needs to be a program where you can partner with business, and have them hand out flyers about Energy Star, and where it will equate to an economic saving. • Stanley: I talked to some people who were talking about getting new washers. The rebates can have a positive effect. • York: I wouldn't do Coloradoan ads, I'd do posters. • Stanley: There are ways to get the message out other than the Coloradoan. • Moran: Do you think bill boards catch the eye? • Moore: I would survey your focus group to see what they think is best. Air Quality Advisory Board 09/18/2003 Page 4 of 6 • Moran: Having an attendance at events, such as the mall, can be very expensive, and Labor intensive. • Stanley: You have to make contact with and talk to people, get them engaged in some way. For me the local events don't work that well. • York: There's the Sustainable Living Fair. That would be a good place. • Dennison: You should develop some measures and indicators. A lot of people at the Sustainable Living Fair do the right things to begin with. Interactive displays are great too, like wind turbines with moving parts. • Stanley: I would suggest radio ads for the idling campaign. Get them while they're in their cars. Also, there are bill boards at the tracks on Horsetooth. Nancy York would like to receive a copy of the budget information that was presented to the NRAB. Pesticide Spraying ( Not on the agenda) • 'brine: I would like to request that the AQAB make a recommendation to Council on the pesticide spraying that may happen again next year. • Stanley: There's interest coming from the NRAB to form a joint ad hoc task force with AQAB that looks at pesticide spraying and makes a recommendation to Council before next spring. • York: There was a great soapbox in the Coloradoan today. • Dennison: What do we need to do to form an ad hoc committee? • Stanley: The idea is to bring two or three members from each board to make a more integrated recommendation with all of the issues. • Trine: I'm in favor of this. When will the City figure out the risk, or will they? • Smith: The NRAB and AQAB could have a presentation from the City and get feedback from task force members. Each board would make its own recommendation. • Stanley: I was thinking a couple members from the NRAB and AQAB to study City policies on pesticide spraying. • Smith: I would think the full boards would want to consider the issue before it comes around. The ad hoc committee could meet and come to the full boards for action. • Trine: We should get the presentation the NRAB got. • Dennison: Eight CSU faculty members wrote a letter saying the aerial spraying was basically a bad idea, and that it wasn't thought out very well. Obviously it comes from people with training and packs a bit of a punch. I have actually been pondering and exploring what people at CSU might be able to do for the City and County in regards to this issue. They might decide it's not a good idea to spray. The question is complex. No one wants to see them do what they did this year. We don't even know what kind of mosquito season we'll have next year. • York: Would you be willing to be on the task force? • Dennison: If I'm not involved in another way. • Trine: There's the issue of a person's right to "opt out". • Dennison: There are effects we don't understand. It's death versus people getting midnight spraying of their yards. It's a difficult toxological risk assessment problem. • Smith: I will find out what's known about the plans, and gather information on any time frames. • Bacon: I'm in favor of expressing our disappointment that it wasn't brought to us before. Air Quality Advisory Board 09/18/2003 Page 5 of 6 • Trine: We could have made a more informed recommendation. • Dennison: The City will have to develop a plan that will not just be spray or not spray. This is a hot bed. We don't want a knee jerk reaction. It has to be done carefully, and I don't know that the City is thinking about studying it to that degree. • Smith: I think the task force is a good idea. • Stanley: Let's assume we're going to do something. I would like to get something started quickly. I don't want to wait. • York: I think we should invite Eric Levine. He did an enormous amount of research. • Stanley: We'll get something started within the week. I'll send out an email. TRANSFORT, Tom Frazier, Marlys Sittner Frasier said he's here to provide feedback on the plans for alternative fuels. Right now the only two alternative fuels we're using are CNG and propane, and it's pretty minimal. But, beginning this fall we're installing a CNG station, Transfort will put a CNG station at our site. In the next month we'll receive two more CNG vehicles. There will be a total of 17 or 18 vehicles by 2008. With conversion of our diesels we anticipate a reduction in NOX and CO. Our plans are to go ahead and go into the CNG market until hydrogen gets through its testing program. It's being tested at several agencies around the US. Our Fleet Department is looking for transit and other vehicles in the fleet to do something in the realm of hydrogen. In the interim, instead of ordering more diesels, we're going to do CNG. Beginning this fall we'll work with fleet to pilot test bio- diesel. We're going to test an 80/20 fuel combination to start off. That piece is set up through a grant program that Fleet has identified. Testing for that is going to be a combination of us running the program, and taking the vehicles down to Denver for emissions testing. • Frazier: On Friday, September 26, there's a workshop in Telluride. • York: Is anyone from staff going? • Frazier: There's lots of interest. If the success rate for bio diesel is as high for us as it's been for others, the next step would be 100% bio diesel fuel. • York: If this is true, about the reductions, it would seem like you'd want to get to 100% pretty fast. • Walters: So you're going to try the 80/20 and then have emissions tested? • Frazier: Yes, and check the engine. It's a much better fuel as far as wear and tear on the engines. • Dennison: What is the relative cost of bio diesel versus regular diesel? • Frazier: About 20 cents more a gallon. • Dennison: If maintenance is taken into account then potentially it's not more expensive. Are there any federal subsidies? • Frazier: No, not at this point. Congress is going through a difficult time with transportation because of trying to get the reauthorization act passed. • Bacon: Will the CNG station be public or private? • Frazier: It will be on our property, so the Federal Transit Admin won't let us go public. If we could get a certain number of vehicles they would put in a public CNG station. We can't get enough people committed to do CNG. Air Quality Advisory Board 09/18/2003 Page 6 of 6 • Frazier: The good thing we can do as a City is show some leadership in the community_ To provide leadership and provide the opportunity for a public/private partnership. ` • York: Having a functional transit system would be a wonderful show of leadership. Our downtown is going to be in failure because of the number of vehicles. The Transportation Board is recommending to increase the Number 1 bus. • . Frazier: They're recommending increasing all of the routes, and set up a ride free zone downtown. • York: The Master Transportation Plan calls for a Mason Street Enhanced corridor at the top of the list. I'm curious about the enhanced travel on Mason, Harmony, and Timberline. Given the costs of expansion, and there being no money, I wish we'd just go that way to see if we can mitigate some of our problems without having to widen every road in the town. • Frazier: There's a mixture to whatever we do. Every year I'm still truly amazed by the commitment our community has made to transportation, parks and recreation, and other areas, compared to other towns we visit. We have areas that need improvements and things we need to do. We're pretty blessed, but need to keep working. • York: Transit fares are coming up in the middle of next moth. Are they going up? • Frazier: Yes, These are the fares we proposed last July. It's an increase for Dial -A -Ride, and it's ap increase on the fixed route passes, and general fare. • York: Will youth have to pay? • Frazier: Yes, it will go from free, to a quarter. Air Quality Policies Smith reviewed a handout and updated the board on where we are and what has happened since the last discussion. Adjournment The meeting was adjourned at 7:35 p.m. Submitted by Terry Klahn Administrative Support Supervisor