Health district woes may stall air cleanup

Tuesday, Feb. 15, 2000 | 10:58 a.m.

In order to clean the air in the Las Vegas Valley, Clark County officials may first have to clear the air in the Health District.

A hostile atmosphere in the Health District's Air Quality Division may be slowing progress on meeting federal air pollution guidelines in Clark County, a legislative subcommittee was told Monday.

Employees told the committee the health district fell behind processing air quality permits, that enforcement decisions are based on politics and that emissions records are poorly kept. This all came out during a five-hour hearing at the Sawyer State Office Building prompted by serious federal penalties facing Southern Nevada if air quality is not improved.

Sen. Jon Porter, R-Boulder City, chairman of the subcommittee, termed the complaints "serious concerns," noting a consistent theme in the testimony: distrust between Health District administrators and employees.

David Souten, principal partner in Arlington, Va.-based ENVIRON International Corp., a consultant for the Legislature, said his firm would investigate the complaints presented to the subcommittee as part of a review and analysis on Southern Nevada's air quality due to the Legislature by September.

"Innuendo and rumor will not be used, because this process is as close to an audit as you can get," Souten said, adding that all levels of Southern Nevada's approach to clearing the air from health to transportation will be examined.

An independent investigation can't come soon enough for some health district employees, two of whom spoke under the state's whistleblower protection at the hearing. A total of six employees have filed complaints against the district.

Elizabeth Gilmartin, 39, the supervisor who reviews new pollution sources in the health district's Air Quality Division, said she works under constant tension.

There is no accurate inventory of polluters, Gilmartin said. "I'm a supervisor," she said. "I don't have access to the databases."

Her workload has grown remarkably, she said. The average number of permits issued to new projects was 60 per year. Last year it reached 562, Gilmartin said.

"Our program needs to be environmentally based, rather than politically based," Gilmartin said.

Gilmartin said she had been asked by administrators to keep employee David Hoch under surveillance without his knowledge. His computer access had been restricted, but Gilmartin could tap into Hoch's terminal to see what he was working on.

Hoch last month won a $10,000 award on a complaint he filed more than three years ago against the Health District for harassment and stress.

Gilmartin said she has been in the air quality program seven years and was promoted to her present position in 1996. "I didn't want to be a whistle-blower," she said, noting that she suffers from high blood pressure and has been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease that may be related to stress on the job.

Sen. Dina Titus, D-Las Vegas, said concerned workers had approached her after the 1999 Legislature approved a study of Clark County's air quality program using funds collected from motorists by the state.

Titus suggested that the Desert Research Institute, a research arm of the University of Nevada System, should collect pollution inventories as an independent source. "I don't think their own inventory," Titus said, referring to the health district, "would have much credibility."

Gilmartin urged the lawmakers to focus on improving the air.

"My overriding interest here is clean air, not bashing the administration or the political process," Gilmartin said to Titus.

On Friday another air quality employee, Wilbert Townsend, resigned after being told not to attend a Pollution Control Hearing Board hearing on a company he was assigned to track.

Townsend, president of the Nevada Public Health Association, said he had attended the hearing on Thursday when Chemical Lime was on the agenda. He said he had permission of his immediate supervisor Gilmartin to attend.

He was told by Air Quality Division Director Michael Naylor and his assistant Michael Sword that he should return to his desk. Townsend said he resigned, then attended the hearing on his own time.