Critics’ dander up over pollution rules

Wednesday, Oct. 8, 2003 | 8:56 a.m.

Clark County adopted a raft of new air quality regulations Tuesday, but most people will notice little difference from the ones already on the books, officials said.

In some cases, the definitions of controlled air pollutants were modified and other ordinances changed the language of existing regulations slightly. Some of the revisions, including several ordinances adopted Tuesday, bring the county's regulatory language into line with federal language that is either on the books or expected by the end of the year.

"Basically, all we wanted to do was to get our ordinances to match the federal regulations," said Carrie MacDougall, assistant director for the county's air quality department.

Not everybody was happy with the proposals. Line-Noue Memea, government relations specialist for the Las Vegas chapter of Associated General Contractors, a construction-industry group, unsuccessfully argued to keep the county from adopting regulations governing very fine particulate matter, or smoke particles and dust under 2.5 microns in diameter.

The ordinance adopted Tuesday mirrors federal language governing how much of the fine dust is allowed in the air. No control measures were included in the ordinance.

"We believe the standard is unnecessarily stringent and we do not believe there is any scientific backing for the standard," Memea said.

Also arguing against the rule revisions was longtime government critic Bob Hall, president of the Nevada Environmental Coalition. Hall had opposed the air-quality regulations adopted two years ago and is challenging those rules in court, challenges that are among more than three dozen legal and administrative appeals he has made against various local and federal agencies.

Hall has argued that the local and federal agencies have to do more to stop development. Hall criticized the county's recently launched advertising campaign to stop dust kicked up by trucks and other off-highway uses. The county has targeted the problem as the single largest source of airborne dust, which is classified by the federal government as a serious health hazard in the Las Vegas area.

"We know that it's development and disturbed land that is causing the problem," he said in reference to dust pollution.

"If this body wants to resolve this problem, we remain available. We are not going to sit back and take this abject rudeness that we've been subject to. You can't stand the truth, can you?"

MacDougall told the commission that Hall never attended a series of seven workshops that her department held on the pollution rule changes.