Scapca Starts On Plan To Stop Field Burning Board Takes On Familiar Task Of Creating Suitable Plan For Phasing Out Grass Burning
Spokane’s air quality board starts work today on a controversial proposal to snuff out grass field burning.
The five-member Spokane County Air Pollution Control Authority board begins writing into law what a board majority approved in December: a plan to phase out Kentucky bluegrass field burning, probably within seven years.
It’s not the first time the SCAPCA board has tried to ban field burning, which releases hundreds of tons of pollutants into Spokane’s skies for a few weeks each year.
In September 1989, the board also voted to phase out field burning.
It didn’t happen. Working with grass industry lobbyists, the board rewrote the proposal behind closed doors, according to agency records.
The regulation was revised after a March 1990 public hearing attended by 250 people. Dozens of people with lung problems testified in favor of a burning ban, while farmers said a ban would kill the bluegrass industry.
The regulation SCAPCA presented at the hearing called for:
A 30,566-acre cap on Spokane County bluegrass fields.
A 5 percent-a-year, pro-rata reduction on fields burned - to 21,400 acres by 1995.
No burning on Fridays, weekends and holidays.
A three-week burning season.
Many of those provisions were never enacted.
In May 1990, the SCAPCA board approved a revised regulation at its regular monthly meeting.
Grass growers got a larger cap on bluegrass acreage countywide - 35,000 acres. The new regulation didn’t mention pro-rata reductions. Nor did it mention smoke reduction.
Fred Gray, SCAPCA’s director at the time, opposed the 35,000-acre cap, complaining it was equivalent to “no limit at all.” But the board overruled him.
“We tried to reach a compromise,” explained Jan Monaco, executive director of the Spokane County Medical Society and the only current SCAPCA board member who also served in 1990.
The board approved the revisions after the growers took them on a tour of Palouse bluegrass farms.
The 1990 regulation didn’t give growers everything they asked for, including the right to burn on Fridays and an unlimited burning season in seven county control zones.
They also lost on “base acreage,” a system SCAPCA put in place to allocate burning rights within the county.
When the SCAPCA board again voted to phase out field burning last December, board members also agreed to drop base acreage.
This time around, the players are different.
SCAPCA Director Eric Skelton wasn’t in Spokane during the first burning ban proposal. He was hired in 1991 to replace Gray, who was demoted.
A new SCAPCA member, John Roskelley, sparked last month’s vote for a burn ban. Spokane County Commissioner Steve Hasson and Monaco also voted in favor.
Spokane City Councilman Mike Brewer voted against it, and Fairfield dentist Harry Gibbons wasn’t present. His term on the SCAPCA board expired Dec. 31.
Now the board has a new member, Fairfield City Councilman Kevin Ottosen, recently elected at a meeting of Spokane County mayors.
As in 1990, the grass seed industry is gearing up for another fight.
The Intermountain Grass Growers Association has hired a public relations firm, Savvy Marketing of Coeur d’Alene.
Shortly after last month’s vote, the firm issued a news release saying growers plan to challenge the “fairness and legality” of SCAPCA’s decision.
But Monaco and Hasson predict the new burn ban proposal will hold up.
“I’ve tried to put everybody on notice. We are working our way toward a ban - probably in seven years,” Hasson said.
, DataTimes