Editorial: Mayor's Efforts to Clean City's Air Commendable

By Frances Allday, Publisher

"Clean air, huh," my uncle mused, "well, don't know much about that." This was his response back in 1983 when I mentioned that I was going to Washington to lobby for renewal of the Clean Air Act. He worked for thirty years in Deer Park at one of the largest oil refineries in the area. He earned a good salary there and was able to provide his family with a decent standard of living. It was hard doing shift work all those years, but the company rewarded him with promotions and technical training. Plant emissions were a fact of life in refinery work, and people like my uncle were more concerned with earning a living. Their jobs were needed for the refining and distribution of oil, and the hazards were considered an inevitable byproduct. The Gulf coast has reaped the economic benefits of oil refining, but has also had to bear an environmental burden in order to supply the rest of the country with oil products.

When I went to Washington for the lobbying effort it was under the auspices of a group called the National Clean Air Coalition. The group organizers were surprised to find someone from Houston who was interested in clean air. Being from the Northeast, they assumed that Texans were not concerned, since we were a "big oil" state. Ignoring their regional bias, I countered that there were many Houstonians who were concerned about clean air, and by the way, didn't everyone in the group use oil to travel to D.C.?  

In fact, in the early '80s I helped to found a group called Houstonians For a Strong Clean Air Act. One of our projects was to get the Houston Health Department to keep all its air monitoring stations in working order. At that time there were only four, and they mainly measured ozone levels. We also urged city leaders to pass a resolution supporting renewal of the Clean Air Act. We managed to get the City to make the monitoring stations operable, and even got one of the daily newspapers to report on the ozone levels. But we could not get any city leaders interested in passing a resolution.

Now fast forward to the present day. We have very sophisticated air monitoring stations around the city, and a state agency that reports the air quality hour by hour online. We also have ozone alerts reported by every TV station and weather report. We have the mayor and city council considering an ordinance to penalize plant emissions that affect air quality. So where is Houston now, 20 plus years after the Clean Air Act was renewed? We are where the rest of the country is, dependent upon oil and other chemicals, such as polymers and resins. Take away every plastic item in your home and remove every drop of oil from your vehicles and you will realize the extent to which oil affects our daily lives. 

There has been very little national leadership over the last twenty years in solving air quality problems and instituting a national energy policy. So other ad hoc groups, self proclaimed environmental gurus, and local politicians have stepped in to try to fill the void. Some have offered unrealistic solutions, or ignored the delicate balance between the needs of industry and the consumer, and a healthy environment. Mayor White has jumped into the air quality arena by proposing to use a nuisance ordinance to penalize industries that omit carcinogenic chemicals such as benzene. The problem is, the mayor has limited jurisdiction to enforce city ordinances outside of Houston, and many plants are located in other cities such as Pasadena. The main component of the mayor's plan is to negotiate with the plants to reduce their benzene levels within the next five years. If they do not, the city will issue a fine and file objections to the State when a plant requests a new permit.

The plan has already received strong criticism from mayors in nearby cities who do not want the City of Houston reaching beyond its limits. Industries in the ship channel area have also objected to the plan, claiming they want to take voluntary measures to reduce emissions. Whether the mayor can negotiate with these industries or not, the fact remains that his plan is a positive sign that city officials recognize the need for the city to play a role in improving air quality for its citizens. City governments need to work with federal and state agencies to regulate air quality. There are a number of bills in the state legislature now to set emission standards and the city should have input.  Mayor White is to be commended for his efforts to seek cleaner air for Houstonians. Now is the time for the national, state, and local government to work together to effectively bring about air quality improvement for everyone.

(Near Northwest Banner, April 5, 2007)