
                         THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
                 Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, June 22, 1994                    TAG: 9406220002 
SECTION: FRONT                     PAGE: A8    EDITION: FINAL  
SOURCE: By VICTOR A. BLANDIN 
DATELINE: 940622                                 LENGTH: Medium

ANOTHER VIEW: FIGHTING (STILL) FOR CLEAN AIR IN VIRGINIA

{LEAD} Regarding ``Readers need a variety of opinion'' by J. Kevin Markwell (letter, June 4) and ``EPA's clean-air push: unneeded and unwelcome'' by Jeffrey E. Locke (Another View, June 4): I congratulate Mr. Maxwell on a well-reasoned and civil description of a newspaper's responsibility to provide a balanced factual account of the news and happenings - local, national and international. Editors and columnists, when voicing opinions, should be just as responsible for the facts and the rumors.

On the other hand, I suggest to Mr. Locke and our new boy on the block, editorial-page editor John Barnes, that they review the history of the Environmental Protection Agency and various state watchdogs and their dealings with the matter of clean air in Virginia.

{REST} About 17 years ago, when the Air Pollution Control Board, the Water Control Board, the Environmental Protection Agency and to some extent the Army Corps of Engineers were pretty much politicized and in the pockets of the petroleum, coal and electric-power industries, two important events occurred.

First, the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors took the initiative and, at county expense, set up a sophisticated monitoring network, countrywide, to measure air quality in accordance with and sometimes in excess of EPA standards. This was followed by state requirements to conduct vehicle-emissions inspections in Northern Virginia and an additional gasoline tax of 5 cents per gallon levied in the same area. There have been few indications of mom-and-pop service stations going out of business as a result of these actions. That was good government at the county level.

The rest of the state had sparse coverage and depended on the coal companies to report on particulate emissions.

Second, a small group of concerned Hampton Roads citizens organized to defeat the efforts of some local ``entrepreneurs,'' backed by Houston Texas bubba muscle, to build an oil refinery on the Elizabeth River, less than an air mile from downtown Norfolk, downtown Portsmouth and Portsmouth Naval Hospital.

The city councils of Hampton Roads, and this newspaper, fell all over themselves in support of the project, completely snowed by the overwhelming public relations of the bubbas. The Air Pollution Control Board gave unconscionable support to the project, based on highly suspect data and opinions.

Finally, Norfolk City Council came to its senses and voted against the insanity of the project. The other city councils, except Portsmouth, soon followed suit. That was good government as a result of direct action of thousands of citizens at the grass-roots level to inform City Council of the true ``state of the state.''

We don't need political appointees, with narrow special interests, sitting on ad-hoc committees of the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality drafting policies and procedures - reminds me of Dan Quayle's spurious Council on Competitiveness.

The simplistic idea that West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania cause all or even a majority of our air-quality problems is fallacious. The infiltration of the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality by political hacks is destructive and dangerous to our health.

There are such people as honest, conscientious, expert and apolitical bureaucrats in state and federal governments, and they have made much progress and become more aware of environmental realities since 1977. by CNB