For the past six years we made no progress in mitigating the cause of bad air quality on the Nipomo Mesa. It took our former Air Pollution Control Officer (APCO), Larry Allen, six years before he issued an abatement order. The abatement order gave multiple options, including closing 100, 200, or 400 acres of riding area.
Now, we have a new APCO, Gary Willey, who is ignoring Larry’s recommendations and wants to settle for vegetating 18.4 acres. The Air Pollution Control District’s staff estimates that vegetating 20 acres will result in a 7 to 11 percent reduction in pollution. Let’s call it 9 percent. Why did Willey agree to only 9 percent? That leaves 91 percent of the pollution still in the air. That won’t move the needle on the number of pollution violation days.
The abatement order is unclear, but assuming they mean to add 5 percent points of reduction each year, in year two we would be at only 14.5 percent pollution reduction. Also, the order has no performance metrics and no penalties for non-performance. Ridiculous!
Mr. Willey needs to read the clean air goals posted on his agency’s website and start doing his job or resign.
Richard Wishner
Nipomo
This article appears in Mar 22 – Apr 1, 2018.
Why is it that folks move into an area with too much dust or too much noise are the ones to complain when the airport, freeway or sand dues happened to be in place first? Nipomo had the sand blowing before developers started building. This is why the land was so cheap and they made so much money. They didn’t disclose that the wind blew the
sand over the entire mesa..
I say mother nature must be laughing and saying I was here first, and asking why don’t the people with breathing problems move? Some pf the people had lung problems before they moved onto the mesa or smoked for years causing lung problems.
Oh and what about the airports that have planes and jets taking off and landing? The people buying homes at the end of or near airports sue because of the noise or the traffic after they move in. This is all bs. They knew these problems existed and they didn’t think far enough ahead. But it was “CHEAP”.
You don’t get my support of vote.