PHOENIX — Maricopa County’s Board of Supervisors is charged with many tasks, including ensuring air quality around the county.
The board is hoping a pair of actions taken during Wednesday’s meeting will advance that goal.
The board unanimously approved submission of a report that will meet EPA requirements after a public hearing to solicit comments on a proposed revision to the Arizona air quality plan.
Supervisor Jack Sellers praised Maricopa County Air Quality Department Director Phil McNeely saying McNeely and staff along with Intel Corp. found tough-to-locate green-energy credits and converted an entire waste management vehicle fleet to natural gas power.
“Phil, I can’t thank you and your team enough for getting this done,” Sellers said.
In separate actions taken later in the meeting, the board approved amendments to air quality agreements with the cities of Phoenix and Mesa and approved new agreements with the EPA and with the Regional Transportation Authority.
The amendments to the Mesa and Phoenix agreements allow county staff access to specific wells or monitoring sites.
The EPA agreement is for spending about $381 million in federal assistance for environmental projects — an increase of $129 million beyond previously authorized federal funding.
The contract with the RTA calls for the county to spend $200,000 with the agency, which will arrange a transportation reduction incentive program and, through Valley Metro, a clean air campaign.
Valley Metro is the greater Phoenix area’s bus and light rail authority.
Blue Crowley, a frequent commenter at Maricopa County meetings for many years, said he expected the plan to be put together with the transparency and input format used in the past.
“Air quality is the drum I’ve been beating for a long time,” Crowley said. “But is it multimodal? The rail parts of this plan, how often does a bus pick up where rail leaves off? Two-thirds of Mesa still has zero bus service.”
According to the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality’s website, azdeq.gov, the state implementation plan, commonly referred to as a SIP, is a reference to a cumulative record of all air pollution strategies, state statutes, state rules, and local ordinances implemented under Title I of the federal Clean Air Act by government agencies within Arizona.
“There is no one ‘state implementation plan’ to refer to,” ADEQ says. “Instead, there are multiple revisions to the SIP that are updated and referenced when managing Arizona’s air quality.”
Since Arizona’s first submittal in 1972, ADEQ says the plan’s revisions, statutes, ordinances and rules are to be regularly updated by ADEQ’s Air Quality Division’s SIP Section.
“Once revisions to Arizona’s SIP are approved by the Environmental Protection Agency and published in the Federal Register, the SIP becomes enforceable by federal and state government. The contents within the plan, mandate permits and compliance practices.”
The board also unanimously approved all planning and zoning hearing and consent-agenda items at Wednesday’s meeting, along with $3.1 million to funding construction of two affordable housing projects on Broadway Road, northwest of downtown Phoenix.
Jason W. Brooks is a News editor for the Daily Independent and the Chandler Independent.
He covers the Chandler area for both yourvalley.net and the monthly print edition while writing for and assisting in the production of the Daily Independent.
Brooks is a well-traveled journalist who has documented life in small American communities in nearly all U.S. time zones.
Born in Washington, D.C. and raised there and in suburban Los Angeles, he has covered community news in California, New Mexico, Arkansas, Iowa, Nebraska and northern Arizona.
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