AQMD Honors Local Clean Air Heroes at its 16th Annual Clean Air Awards

Oct. 13, 2004

LOS ANGELES — The South Coast Air Quality Management District (AQMD) hosted its 16th Annual Clean Air Awards today, singling out individuals, small business owners, communities and corporations for significant contributions to cleaner air in the Southland over the past year.

In a luncheon at the Los Angeles Convention Center emceed by public television producer Huell Howser, AQMD honored 14 recipients including a physician, a major entertainment corporation and three cleaners who switched from perchloroethylene dry cleaning to non-toxic “wet cleaning.” California State Sen. Martha Escutia and Assemblymember Fran Pavley were lauded for their advocacy and leadership on clean air issues in the state Legislature.

“From individuals driven by the desire to ensure a cleaner air for future generations, to a coalition of cities that worked together to replace hundreds of polluting diesel trucks, our 2004 Clean Air Award winners represent the best and the brightest in our quest for better air quality,” said William Burke, Ed. D., chairman of AQMD’s Governing Board.

AQMD’s 2004 Clean Air Award winners are:

State Sen. Martha Escutia (D-Whittier) this year championed a measure seeking to speed up emission reductions from locomotives and rail yards in the region. Although the bill was not successful, it cast a strong spotlight on the need to reduce locomotive emissions and advanced bipartisan discussion of ways to combat this major source of toxic and smog-forming air pollution. Among measures she has successfully shepherded into law during the past several years are legislation to help prevent toxic contamination at schools and a bill ensuring that state air quality standards would be set at levels that protect infants and children. Sen. Escutia’s legislative efforts also have created an interagency environmental justice group to help ensure that low-income and disadvantaged communities do not suffer disproportionate impacts from air pollution.

“My constituents in southeast Los Angeles face pollution from all environmental media – air, land, and water,” Escutia said. “They breathe polluted air from industrial manufacturing, congested freeways and locomotives. What better way to reduce health care costs and illnesses than to prevent asthma and other respiratory diseases by improving air quality through pollution control measures?

Assemblymember Fran Pavley (D-Agoura Hills) successfully sponsored a bill this year requiring that all commercial trucks entering the state, including those from Mexico, meet all applicable federal emission standards.

Pavley this year also sponsored a bill signed by the governor to grant carpool lane access for single-occupant hybrid or alternative fuel vehicles that get 45 mpg or better fuel economy. She co-authored this year AB 923, which created major new funding opportunities to fight diesel emissions by authorizing local air districts to approve a $2 fee to fund clean-up programs. In 2002, AB 1493, her landmark global warming bill was signed into law, setting into motion a program for the state to reduce or limit the growth of greenhouse gas emissions from automobiles and light duty trucks.

“I was proud to carry AB 1493 in the beginning, and very pleased to see the California Air Resources Board adopt the final regulations last month,” Pavley said. “California is again leading the way in the fight for cleaner air for all of our citizens.”

Dr. Henry Gong Jr. earned the AQMD’s 2004 Robert M. Zweig, M.D. Memorial Award, which honors the Riverside physician who dedicated himself to eradicating smog and the pursuit of hydrogen power as a clean fuel alternative. Gong has served at Rancho Los Amigos Medical Center since 1992. He wears many hats there including chief of the Environmental Health Service, a world-renowned research facility investigating the health effects of air pollution. He is also a professor of medicine and preventative medicine at the University of Southern California’s Keck School of Medicine.

The Inland Empire Utilities Agency, a municipal water district, in partnership with the Milk Producers Council, voluntarily developed two livestock waste digestion demonstration projects to transform cattle manure into renewable energy and fertilizer products. The project successfully reduces the emission of smog- and particulate-forming volatile organic compounds and ammonia into our air, and also reduces potential groundwater contamination.

The Walt Disney Company currently has more than 11,000 employees in its “Clean Air Commuting” program -- roughly 40 percent of the company’s Southern California work force. Some of the programs encouraging Disney employees to rideshare include a 0.25% reduction of the approved annual percentage rate for an employee’s car loan if the vehicle uses an alternative fuel; fully subsidized bus passes, subsidies for monthly Metrolink passes and free shuttle service between Anaheim neighborhoods and the Disney resort area. Through its commuting programs, Disney employees eliminated an estimated 142,000 tons of pollutants in 2003.

The City of Riverside has enacted innovative measures that are significantly improving air quality in the region. Through an 11-point program, the city promoted alternative fuel vehicles for both public and private use; opened to the public a compressed natural gas fast-fill fueling station; implemented AQMD’s Clean Air Choice program to give new car buyers information on “air friendly” vehicles; and adopted an air quality element into the city’s general plan to address air quality issues as they relate to land use, transportation demands, and jobs-housing balance.

The Gateway Cities Council of Governments, representing 27 cities in southeast Los Angeles County and the Port of Long Beach, has shown outstanding leadership in establishing a program that so far has scrapped and replaced more than 240 old, polluting heavy-duty diesel trucks, and installed pollution control devices on nearly 600 other pieces of diesel equipment used in the Port of Long Beach.

Angelica Roque began serving her community of El Segundo in 1998 when she surfaced -- at the age of 11 -- as the dynamic leader and spokesperson of Tree Musketeers. In 2000, Roque was elected president of the environmental organization, and the then 13-year-old soon coordinated a tree-planting project in which 330 volunteers celebrated the new millennium by planting more than 100 trees along a barren street connecting El Segundo to the beach.

This project was part of a three-year nationwide campaign by Tree Musketeers to empower one million kids to dedicate one million hours to planting one million trees. Angelica herself planted the millionth tree on the Capitol lawn in Washington, D.C.

Andrea Hricko serves as the Southern California Environmental Health Center’s Director of Community Outreach and Education programs. She has been instrumental in fostering community involvement in the center’s research into the health impacts of air pollution, and the incidence of respiratory disease and cancer. She works with students, teachers, community-based organizations, health care providers, and policy makers to help them understand the sources of pollution affecting their lives, and what they can do to help improve air quality in their communities.

Ines Mireles, Del Mar Natural Cleaners; Moon Noh, San Clemente Natural Cleaning Center and Hans Kim, Nature’s Best Cleaners, are cleaners who embraced a new, non-toxic water-based technology at a time when professional wet cleaning was relatively unknown in the United States. For more than three years, they have worked closely with the Pollution Prevention Education & Research Center at Occidental College to help demonstrate the commercial viability of wet cleaning and its environmental benefits. They willingly share their knowledge with other cleaners by inviting them to their shops to see the equipment operate. At least 200 dry cleaners have met with them to learn more about wet cleaning.

The American Lung Association of the Inland Counties serves an area that has the worst air quality in the nation. It has taken a leadership role in the effort to increase public awareness of the health problems associated with air pollution, and the actions people can take to improve air quality. Educational efforts include asthma management training programs for childcare providers and school nurses. In the past year, more than 900 childcare staff from 186 preschools received training in how to recognize asthma symptoms and what to do when a child has an asthma attack. The Lung Association also conducts a special program where high school automotive students learn about proper car maintenance to help reduce pollution.

The Center for Community Action & Environmental Justice is an environmental health resource center that conducts advocacy work for communities in Riverside and San Bernardino counties. The Center’s focus is on assisting residents, especially those in low-income, high-risk communities. Recently, the center was instrumental in Riverside County’s ban on the land application of sewage sludge. The center also helped convince Jurupa Unified School District officials to replace its entire fleet of diesel school buses with compressed natural gas models.

AQMD is the air pollution control agency for Orange County and major portions of Los Angeles, San Bernardino and Riverside counties.

AQMD HONORS LOCAL CLEAN AIR HEROES AT ITS 16TH ANNUAL CLEAN AIR AWARDS

Oct. 13, 2004