Fairbanks, AK - The Fairbanks North Star Borough Assembly agreed to put $150 thousand dollars in federal funding toward the completion of a state implementation plan, or SIP, for air quality control.
Borough’s Air Quality Division manager Jim Conner told the assembly the SIP includes a whole host of different tools and analyses. “The SIP requires development of an emission inventory, budget, modeling tools … many, many details that have to go into this plan and most of this work is already accomplished," he said. The borough requested funding from the federal government in 2011 to develop the SIP. The money approved Thursday night will go toward the final write up and completion of the plan.
The approval comes just as the Environmental Protection Agency warns the golden Heart City that it could lose its highway money and see federal regulations imposed. The EPA has set a deadline for a clean air quality standards plan on December 14th.
Borough voters go to the polls on October third. On the ballot is a proposition that could bar the borough from imposing any air quality regulations. KUAC will continue to follow this story as it develops.
*story reported with help from the Associated Press.