LAKEPORT >> The Director of the Lake County Air Management District conducted a workshop at the Board of Supervisor’s meeting this week which proposed rule amendments and fees to pay for service that may undergo changes by the district officers.
Doug Gearhart, Lake County Air Quality Managment director noted the last time changes were proposed were in 1996. “A final draft gets reviewed by the state and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and gets back to the BOS for final review and consideration he said. The Air District ended the Burn Ban on November 15.”
But the Air district does not have a fire season. They are also looking at Nov. 1 as a proposed alternative. But they would need to offset that with making certain Holidays (Christmas, and others) as No Burn days since there are days when people typically do things together. State law allows the Air District to issue residential burn permits for parcel lots of less than one acre when there is no feasible method of getting rid of the material, and until recently required a Fire Chief’s sign off. But the Air District will repeal Rule 631 requiring a Fire Chief sign off. “The Fire Chiefs Association sent us a letter, they are no longer participants in issuance of Burn Permits, as of this spring,” Gearhart clarified.
There’s lots of modifications being proposed,” Gearhart said. He went on to explain as they are a fee-based entity; they must cover permitting costs plus district overhead. “These changes will get us much closer to cost recovery,” said Gearhart. “We have lots of state mandates, which are unfunded. That’s because the state passed laws that say Air Districts have the authority to adopt the fees to pay for it. But it incentivized operations they monitor to adopt cleaner technologies and the cleaner technologies required less monitoring and less impact on natural resources, so annual permitting costs could be lowered.”
“We’re also proposing to include California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) fees and other administrative pass-through. We spend a lot of time with CEQA,” It’s an extra thing we have not charged for in the past. That includes CEQA review fees. It’s a lot of work for a little bit of money so, we’re now doing a giant fee revision.” He went on to state that they were trying to simplify the process by doing a minor Memorandum of Understanding, instead of a full rule change update.
Gearhart also noted fees have varied over the years but since 1996, CPI has gone up 122%. CPI, Consumer Price Index, measures the average change over time in the prices paid by consumers for a representative basket of goods and services. It tracks the rate of change in U.S. inflation, providing insights into how prices are changing in the economy. The CPI is produced by the Bureau of Labor Statistics and is a key economic indicator used to assess inflation and the cost of living, according to Investopedia.
For an example, Gearhart said, what the Air District proposes for a geothermal power plant, is a 75% increase from 1996, still well below what the CPI was in 1996. “Some facilities will go up more because they were undercharged and the amount of staff time at gas stations are significant and the fees charged were very low” he said. He went on to add that renewal fees have been capped at 50% and will not see that kind of increase in one year.
Durning the public comments time, Patrick Reitz, Lakeport Fire Protection District Fire Chief asked Gearhart, who conducted their fee study, and whether it was made inside or outside. Gearhart answered it was inside. Reitz explained the Fire District was currently going through a fee study and they cannot adjust their rates without going through an exit study. In doing their research he found that an internal study was not feasible for a lot of reasons as it often doesn’t hold up in court. “It will be soundly rejected,” Reitz said. “We had to use an outside, third party independent for our fees to hold up in court, if they were ever challenged.”
Therefore, an internal fee study may not stand if challenged, because you are not using sources that may or may not be qualified Reitz pointed out. “We just got done with that exit study this last year on not only our ambulance rates, but our mitigation fees, county wide as the board is familiar with.” The next thing he chose to discuss was an increase of Burn Permits to $60,” he said.
“And there’s no doubt we need to adjust. I’m not arguing what the rates should or shouldn’t be.be. I want to call attention of the board, the last two years we received numerous complaints from people who have not been able to get their permits; and that the Air District has been non-responsive to phone calls, they’re not keeping normal working hours,” he said.
He said that when it came to customer service, he hopes the Air District sees a return to normal by being responsive when it comes to customer service. “So, I want to call your attention; there is a lot of fuel, out there … and it’s contributing to our fire problem and it’s going to contribute to the spread of fire.”
District 5 Supervisor Jessica Pyska asked when this agenda item returns for a second reading she would like to see a side-by-side analysis of different fees for different businesses and what the impact is; whether a substantial increase, or spread out over years so, it will be clear to the board and the public.
District 2 Supervisor Bruno Sabatier also favored a side-by-side analysis, but he asked, what is the carrot for doing the right things and what is the potential stick for doing things wrong. “I don’t see any of that embedded,” he said. “You continuously have to pay to be inspected, but I’m trying to figure out, how to get people to follow the rules, rather from the intrinsic value of, following rules.
Gearhart explained state law precludes the Air District to impose for example, like a vehicle user fee to generate an income stream. “If we had something like that the Air District fees would be a lot lower. “But there are things we had to balance to fund the mandate,” he said. “Their goal is to get people in compliance.”
Sabatier said he was ready to move forward with code changes but would like not to send anything further to the state until the board had further analysis. He acknowledged there may be No Burn days for weeks at a time, due to hazardous conditions. “So, the Fire Chiefs Association and Cal Fire will let us know when it’s safe to burn.” And he conceded, a fire agency will determine what is a fire hazard.
