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AGC News
Here’s a recap of Prime Connections:
The West Central USDOT Field Office held Prime Connections on October 25, 2012 in Salt Lake City, Utah. It was sponsored by and held at the Utah Association of General Contractors. There were 5 prime contractors and roughly 18 small businesses in attendance (31 people total).
This event matched up prime contractors and small businesses within the transportation industry. The small businesses were able to meet with primes in 15 minute increments that were staggered throughout the morning to allow for optimal meeting times for all involved. Most small businesses had 5 meetings while all had at least 4. This event gave both parties an opportunity to meet and make valuable contacts. The one-on-one atmosphere is a great setting for discussing exactly what the small business can do for the prime contractor.
Of participants surveyed, 100% said they would participate in this event again. One small business said the best part of the event was “arranging for [the] one-on-one opportunity to meet face to face with prospective clients, otherwise it would be a lengthy process for my business.
”Overwhelmingly, the one-on-one feature was the highlight of the event for the small businesses and prime contractors.“I feel that this meet and greet was put together very well,” said one of the participating primes. When asked what they thought the best parts of Prime Connections were, one small business said “one-on-one meetings - very good information and it was a nice way to get introduced.
”Questions were also posed to Prime Connections participants that have utilized SBTRC for other events and resources. One client commented, “Excellent service and willingness to help. I receive new ideas and suggestions to think about in every single meeting that I have. I want to say thank you for your encouragement and support.” When discussing what participants thought the best part of the event was, another client said, “Meeting with USDOT personnel - very helpful in setting up my business and providing very valuable information regarding what services USDOT would provide free of charge for small businesses”.
Because of Prime Connections success, the USDOT Field Office is planning to continue this event in the future.
Thanks again!
Hillary Wittenhagen
Procurement Assistant/ Intern Coordinator
Small Business Transportation Resource Center
West Central Region
Local leaders host air quality summit
2:11 PM, Sep 20, 2012 |
A sign urging parents to turn off their cars stands in front of Santa Clara Elementary School following an air quality assembly at the school Thursday, Aug. 30, 2012. / Jud Burkett / The Spectrum & Daily News
If you go
What: Air Quality Summit.
When: Friday, 8:30 a.m. to noon.
Where: Washington City Community Center, 350 N. Community Center Drive, Washington.
Cost: none.
Related Links
ST. GEORGE - Continuing a regional effort to protect Southern Utah’s clean air, local leaders are set to meet Friday during the third annual Southern Utah Air Quality Summit.
Government leaders, industry experts and business owners are encouraging the public to attend the event, which is slated to focus on transportation issues this year.
“We thought we could cover a few things with the growth in the area, public transportation and long-range planning,” said Bryan Rodgers, Southern Utah district manager for Associated General Contractors.
Rodgers said residents could learn more about transportation plans and the impacts of vehicle exhaust, along with a variety of other issues pertaining to air quality. Some local entities have started using natural gas vehicles, and local mayors have supported recent statewide efforts to encourage less vehicle idling, more use of bicycles and public transportation and other ways to reduce vehicle emissions.
Officials are also working to improve their knowledge of just what the air quality is in Washington County. Since a regional task force was formed in 2006, it has only had access to one air quality monitor - on loan from Summit County - for part of the year. However, the City of St. George approved funding this year for another mobile air quality monitor, which should greatly increase the task force’s ability to gather information, Bill Swenson, air quality coordinator for the city said.
The good news is that air quality appears to still be pristine in the county, based on the data that is available. Swenson said the air monitor is currently being used in the SunRiver subdivision and is registering levels of large particles (PM10) of 0.25 micrograms per cubic meter. The national standard is 150 micrograms per cubic meter.
The county does not have the ability to measure smaller PM2.5 particles, however.
Erin Mendenhall, outreach coordinator with Breathe Utah, and Kim Manwill from the Utah Department of Transportation are the scheduled keynote speakers.
Other presentations are scheduled from the Utah Trucking Association, alternative fuels users and other transportation experts.
A panel discussion is also scheduled with Jimmy Andrus from the Utah Trucking Association, Derrick Pack from Western Rock Products, Mike Shaw from Washington City Fleet Management, Steve Packham with the Division of Air Quality, Curt Hutchings from the Five County Association of Governments, Launi Schmutz from the Washington County School District Transportation Department and Larry Bulloch from the St. George City Public Works Department.
“Hopefully with the good group that comes in we’ll get a lot of good information sharing, solutions, challenges and success stories,” said Robin Erickson, executive director of Utah Clean Cities.
St. George Mayor Daniel McArthur is scheduled to read a proclamation during the summit designating Sept. 16-22 as Air Quality Awareness Week.
Summit seeks to keep air quality
Discussion centers on being proactive
Breathe Utah representative Erin Mendenhall delivers a presentation during the Southern Utah Air Quality Summit on Friday. / Jud Burkett / The Spectrum & Daily News
Written by
Air quality, forecasts and trend reports at www.airquality.utah.gov.
Definitions and tips for better air at www.breatheutah.org.
ST. GEORGE — Anyone who has visited the Wasatch Front recently has seen a curtain of haze covering the valleys, thick enough to obscure the view of nearby mountains.
A variety of industry professionals, state officials and local residents gathered for the third annual Southern Utah Air Quality Summit on Friday to discuss how to keep Washington County’s pollution levels from following suit as the population increases.
“How great it is to be in Southern Utah and not have that become a political issue at this point,” said Washington City Councilman Jeff Turek, referring to air quality concerns discussed in last week’s Salt Lake County mayoral debate.
Friday’s summit addressed the health consequences of particulate matter and ozone in the air. Speakers also told of measures the state and transportation industries are taking to reduce vehicle emissions.
Turek noted that Washington City opened a compressed natural gas fueling station last year and has converted 30 of the city fleet’s 100 vehicles to CNG. The fueling station is available for the public to use, he said.
There are also four CNG stations available to the public in St. George.
“Hopefully we can convert more of our citizenry to clean-burning gas,” Turek said.
The cost of converting a private vehicle is estimated at about $8,000. Turek said the city has planned to spend about $300,000 for the station and vehicle conversion after receiving a federal grant to assist its efforts.
“We hesitated a little bit as we looked at those costs,” he said. “(But) yearly, we have taken out about 84,000 pounds of (carbon dioxide) that would be produced by petroleum and diesel fuels. That turns out to be pretty significant where our little community’s involved.”
Steve MacFarlane, one of the audience members attending the morning conference, said he is in the process of starting a business to promote the use of CNG and educate the public about its use. He recently completed a licensing course at Dixie State College to become a CNG systems inspector.
“That’s the reason I came here today – to meet people with similar interests,” he said.
MacFarlane said he has converted his vehicles to the alternative fuel and questioned why CNG stations don’t advertise their prices.
“If you were driving down the street and saw a sign advertising $1.49 for fuel, I’d think you’d want to find out more about it,” MacFarlane said. “One of the greatest promotional tools, we don’t use.”
Regarding air quality, Steven Packham, a toxicologist with the state’s Division of Air Quality, said ozone and microscopic pollutants known as PM-2.5 raise health concerns, but they already exist in nature at levels that are physically tolerated by most people.
“The real challenge becomes for all of us to not overload that system,” he said, comparing ozone and PM-2.5’s harmful effects at high levels to the harmful effects of too much sun exposure.
Dave McNeill, a planning branch manager with the DAQ, said Southern Utah’s weather system brings the materials that form ozone across the desert from Los Angeles and Las Vegas. When it reaches Washington County, it combines with volatile compounds produced by local vegetation and begins to “cook” while it is carried farther by the wind, he said.
McNeill said the DAQ placed an air quality monitoring station in Hurricane in July after determining the ozone levels there were the highest in the county.
The station collects data on ozone, nitrous oxide, PM-2.5, wind direction and solar radiation that are published in real time on the division’s website.
The PM-2.5 is mostly indicative of pollutants from vehicle emissions.
While Washington County doesn’t have the level of traffic emission problems and the winter temperature inversions observed on the Wasatch Front, traffic levels in Southern Utah are expected to continue increasing during the coming years -- in large part because of the area’s clear skies and the beauty of its environment, ironically.
“We need to be driving less, and that doesn’t just mean leave your car at home. … we can drive smarter,” said Erin Mendenhall, outreach coordinator of nonprofit Breathe Utah.
“The bottom line is, we’re all contributing to air pollution and we’re doing it in many ways,” she said.
(Judy Fahys | The Salt Lake Tribune) Protecting air-quality in the southwestern corner of Utah has become a community affair, with industry and government joining with health and environmental advocates to deal with the dust and soot pollution. A task force has developed guidelines and regulations aimed at keeping the air clean while allowing growth to continue.
Utah’s Dixie fights to save a vital resource: clean air
Environment » Various interests come together around quality of life, quality of air.
By JUDY FAHYS
| The Salt Lake Tribune
First Published Jun 20 2012 11:18 pm • Last Updated Jun 21 2012 12:09 am
St. George » Good quality of life is a term you’re likely to hear when you talk to someone about the lure of Utah’s southwestern corner.
And, while some might highlight the web of bike trails or redrock hiking, parks or golfing, almost everyone mentions the area’s clean, often crystalline air. Protecting that air quality here has become a rallying point for business, government and advocates for health and the environment.
"Lots of people move here for the quality of life and clean air," said Gail Bunker, a member of the St. George City Council. "We’ve got to have good air quality to have people participating in these [outdoor] activities."
"As a city, we’re trying to protect the citizens. We want to be proactive, ahead of the curve."
In other parts of the state, cleaning up the air is not a matter of choice but necessity.
In Utah’s urban heart, the Utah Division of Air Quality has a small army of specialists working full-time on solutions to sooty and dusty pollution on the Wasatch Front that violates the federal Clean Air Act and worries health advocates.
Up north, Cache County is brainstorming fixes for the nasty episodes of microscopic soot called PM 2.5 that sometimes blights the valley basin in winter. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency wants the plan done by the year’s end.
East, in the Uinta Basin, the EPA already has put state and local leaders on notice that unexpectedly high ozone or smoggy pollution in the winter is a problem requiring speedy attention.
Taking action » Here in Washington County, preserving air quality is not mandated but mainstreamed.
Prompted by the super-hot, super-dusty building boom a few years ago, local agencies started fielding complaints about the plants that make construction materials and the construction itself. They zeroed in on the visible signs of pollution, especially dust that has died down along with the building boom.
Meanwhile, state regulators focused on invisible ozone, or smog, that is created by vehicle exhaust and other airborne chemicals that become hazardous after cooking in the sun. Over a five-year period, the state logged 33 "yellow" air quality days at the St. George and Santa Clara monitors and 71 at Zion National Park.
At greatest risk for health problems are retirees who’d moved from northern Utah and children whose families had settled here to be near grandparents and good jobs Outdoor recreationists grouse about the dust too.
St. George Mayor Dan McArthur responded with the Southern Utah Clean Air Task Force and, in recent years, an annual air-quality summit.
"I hate mandates," he said, sharing the idea behind trying to build a consensus around the problem.
"We don’t want to be more strict than we have to," he said, "but we want to make sure we have clean air."
Local groups — from the Citizens for Dixie’s Future to the Associated General Contractors — came together and developed a carrot-and-stick approach. Bryan Rodgers represents the area’s 100-company construction industry on the task force.
"We just wanted to make sure we’re invited to the table when any kind of regulations are discussed," he said.
Now trucks are required to cover their loads, keep dirt off the roads and water work sites. Construction crews must stop jobs when the wind gets strong enough to stir up the dust.
(Judy Fahys | The Salt Lake Tribune) Protecting air-quality in the southwestern corner of Utah has become a community affair, with industry and government joining with health and environmental advocates to deal with the dust and soot pollution. A task force has developed guidelines and regulations aimed at keeping the air clean while allowing growth to continue.
(Judy Fahys | The Salt Lake Tribune) Protecting air-quality in the southwestern corner of Utah has become a community affair, with industry and government joining with health and environmental advocates to deal with the dust and soot pollution. A task force has developed guidelines and regulations aimed at keeping the air clean while allowing growth to continue.
(Judy Fahys | The Salt Lake Tribune) Protecting air-quality in the southwestern corner of Utah has become a community affair, with industry and government joining with health and environmental advocates to deal with the dust and soot pollution. A task force has developed guidelines and regulations aimed at keeping the air clean while allowing growth to continue. Bill Swensen oversees St. George City's clean-air efforts.
An intensive education program by the trade groups reminds members to limit idling and play by the same anti-pollution rules their competitors face.
Monitoring the air » St. George City is also determined to monitor air quality.
"There’s an old saying: if you don’t measure it, you can’t manage it," said Bill Swensen, who oversees the city’s clean air efforts.
This week he picked up an air-pollution monitor, the first owned by the city.
Officials hope their budget will allow a similar $30,000 purchase next year.
St. George has not been not alone in its efforts. Zion National Park has operated monitors for years. And state air regulators are in their second year of studying where to place the devices to get the clearest picture of the problem.
From the state’s standpoint, summertime ozone pollution has been the most pressing concern, partly because the EPA is expected to toughen its ozone standard sometime soon and partly because measurements show the pollutant is close to violating current standards. This is the second year in a row the state air-quality division will set up a network of monitors to help drill down on solutions.
Some of the clues the air scientists have picked up so far have worrisome implications, said Dave McNeill of the state’s air-quality office.
For instance, past monitoring has shown air currents are carrying lots of pollution into Washington County from Las Vegas, the West Coast and probably China. But the coastal shipping ports and Nevada’s coal-fired power plants are beyond the reach of Utah regulators trying to solve Washington County’s pollution problems.
"We’re trying to understand what’s going on," he said. "We’re trying to understand while we have a chance to."
Mike Small, president of the advocacy group Citizens for Dixie’s Future, has been part of the drive for common-sense air-quality protections.
Overall, he gives the city good marks for trying to head off problems before they get unwieldy. But he notes pollution controls haven’t been in full effect during a construction boom time. Plus, pollution drifting from outside Utah’s borders is a worry.
"I don’t know anyone here who wants the quality of life of Vegas," he said. "But if we keep growing like we have been, we could have it."
fahys@sltrib.comTwitter: @judyfutah