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Seven Days

Wednesday, Feb. 18
• The Associated Press reports that the Southern Baptist Convention’s executive committee has voted to withdraw from the Baptist World Alliance, a global fellowship that includes more than 200 other Baptist conventions, because the larger organization has gotten too liberal. If approved by the SBC’s annual meeting delegation this summer, the move is seen as the first step toward withdrawal from a world that has become too liberal.
• Law enforcement teams in Campbell County begin rounding up about 150 persons named in drug trafficking and manufacturing indictments spurred in part by authorities’ concern over evidence of a large-scale methamphetamine problem in the county. Speculation centered on the concept that Campbell Countians were led into the trade by the large number of speeders passing through on I-75.

Thursday, Feb. 19
• The News Sentinel reveals that TVA has been overcharged about $1.5 million dollars by coal interests because of “malfunctioning” TVA scales at its power plants. First time we ever heard of a customer’s own thumb on the scale.
• In town for the annual Republican Lincoln Day Dinner, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas says gay marriage will be a central issue in this year’s presidential election. That’s an issue of grave importance to all right-wing Americans whose principal business is to see to it that the right people marry the right people.

Sunday, Feb. 22
• Reports surface that a man in Knox County custody is believed to have tried to rob convenience stores while brandishing a hair-straightening iron. We’re not going to identify the suspect, but we’re disappointed in him. We believed him when he said he was going straight.

Monday, Feb. 23
• Knox County government posts a Spanish-language version of its website, acknowledging the growing number of Spanish speakers living and working here. Next thing the schools will be requiring kids to learn Spanish just because it’s the first language of the vast majority of inhabitants of the Western Hemisphere.
• TVA officials report they have identified $247 million worth of projects they may have to scrap in order to be competitive with other electric utilities when the industry is deregulated. Does that mean TVA has been overspending customers’ money while it enjoys its monopoly on electric power around the valley? “Noooo,” the agency’s officials say.

Knoxville Found

(Click photo for larger image)

What is this? Every week in "Knoxville Found," we'll print the photo of a local curiosity. If you're the first person to correctly identify this oddity, you'll win a special prize plucked from the desk of the editor (keep in mind that the editor hasn't cleaned his desk in five years). E-mail your guesses, or send 'em to "Knoxville Found" c/o Metro Pulse, 505 Market St., Suite 300, Knoxville, TN 37902.

Last Week's Photo:
The sculpted metal eagle pattern pictured is affixed to the doors of each public entrance to the downtown U.S. Post Office/Tennessee Supreme Court/Union Planters Bank building. Congratulations to Rene Jordan. Because your perceptive peepers recognized the eagle, we’re happy to award your eager ears with the peacock. Get ready to listen to all of your favorite NBC theme songs in your car’s CD player with A Soundtrack of Must See TV. And don’t worry about us; we’ve got another copy.

Clean Air Action?
Knox County waits for the state on dirty air

County Mayor Mike Ragsdale says he does not want to start a local car emissions testing program, preferring the state legislature require inspections statewide.

In fact, Knox County is looking for the state to act on most clean-air initiatives, as an Environmental Protection Agency deadline to come up with a plan for reducing ozone pollution looms.

In April, the EPA will declare Knox and surrounding counties a non-attainment area. Normally, that would mean strict development restrictions until the air is cleaned up. No polluting industry would be allowed to locate or expand in the area, and federal highway dollars would be frozen.

However, by creating an “early action compact” (or EAC) that shows how they will reduce pollution to meet federal standards by 2007, local officials can escape those restrictions. The plan—being formulated jointly by Knox, Anderson, Loudon, Blount, Sevier, Union and Jefferson counties—is due at the end of March.

Ragsdale and Lynne Liddington, the county’s director of air quality management, spoke to Commission on Tuesday about it. They told commissioners they’d be asked to vote on some resolutions next month but offered few details about what those would be. “There’s not a whole lot more we can ask [Commission] to do,” Liddington said after the meeting. “Mostly it’ll be asking them to agree with state legislation.”

One clean-air activist is skeptical the county will reach its goal without vehicle testing. “Knoxville and Memphis are going to have a very hard time getting ozone down in the next few years. So it’s absolutely important that they use every means at their disposal to get emissions down,” says Stephen Smith, executive director of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy.

Ozone is found naturally in the upper atmosphere, but at lower elevations it’s hazardous to humans; at high levels it sears the lungs and causes chronic lung diseases. Also called smog, ozone is formed when nitrogen oxides react with oxygen, sunlight and volatile organic compounds. It is especially a problem on hot, sunny days.

Because Knoxville is surrounded by mountains and isn’t particularly windy, ozone gases are often trapped in the region for long periods of time. But the pollution is manmade and can be controlled. Sources of pollution include car and truck exhaust, utility and industrial emissions, lawn and construction equipment.

Gov. Phil Bredesen has recommended legislation that would give counties the power to start a car inspection and maintenance program. It also gives the state’s Air Pollution Control Board the power to force counties that aren’t in attainment (or are contributing to pollution of counties that aren’t) to start inspections.

But Knox County officials seem to have little stomach to take such measures on their own. “We think the best thing to do is have the state mandate everyone do it,” says the mayor’s spokesman, Mike Cohen. “If the state declines to do that, we will revisit whether we need to do it locally. We’d rather not require it locally because it’s clearly something people are not going to be happy about. County lines are invisible from the air.”

Ragsdale told Metro Pulse a few weeks ago that he worries the inspections would hurt the poor more than anyone, as they often rely on older vehicles that have faulty emissions controls. “Some people in our community rely on these vehicles every day. I see them going to CAC and other places, and they are just barely making ends meet,” Ragsdale said.

Liddington said testing only cars in the seven-county region might not reduce pollution that much because so many cars and tractor-trailers on the Interstates aren’t from here.

The attainment plans rely on computerized models. Non-attainment areas have to demonstrate to the EPA that their plan will reduce emissions to sufficient levels using the computerized model. Air quality is monitored at 12 locations in the seven-county area (including two places in Knox County), and the modeling is based on these figures.

Liddington says the county has yet to produce a model that shows the area in attainment but adds that they’re still crunching numbers.

TVA has made several improvements to its coal-burning power plants, which will help, but these measures aren’t sufficient to lower the pollution to the accepted level.

Some doubt that the air can be cleaned up without vehicle testing. Smith wonders whether the local officials simply lack the gumption to take a stand on a controversial issue. “Local politicians would probably like to have [vehicle inspections] forced on them,” he says.

“Knoxville needs to be more aggressive. Right now, I don’t think Knoxville has a plan to get into attainment,” Smith adds. “At some point the local government has got to pass laws encouraging people to pollute less. I might be wrong, but I haven’t seen any [clean air] laws passed by the County Commission or City Council. There’s a lot of good work going on, but there’s a point when we have to act.”

Liddington told the Commission yesterday that other things that would help reduce ozone pollution include requiring vapor controls at gas pumps, reducing the speed limit to 55 mph through non-attainment areas, enforcing anti-vehicle tampering laws, anti-idling laws, better timed traffic signals, buying hybrid or alternative fuel vehicles for fleets, and truck-stop electrification. Education also plays a big part, she says. Many other actions will also help, including tougher emissions controls for industry, more funding for mass transit, improved traffic flow, incentives for mass transit or car pooling, lawnmower rebate or buyback programs for old models, and stricter controls on construction vehicles.

But neither she nor Ragsdale suggested the Commission would be asked to pass any requirements or incentives. Liddington said they need permission from the state to do anything. In the meantime, the county is in limbo, waiting for the state to act, she says. “We’re putting together a plan based on assumptions,” she says. “But we will have to clean up the air, one way or the other.”

Smith says the Southern Alliance will be watching the process closely. If the model the counties submit shows them falling short of attainment and the EPA still approves the deferral, Southern Alliance will sue the federal agency. “We’re not going to let EPA grant attainment on a wink and a handshake,” he says.

Ozone isn’t the only pollution the Knoxville region exceeds. Next year, the region will be declared non-attainment for particulate matter. Particulate matter is a mixture of solid and liquid compounds that are suspended in air, and include carbon, sulfates, nitrates, metals, acids and semi-volatile compounds. The particles enter the nose, throat and lungs, causing asthma and premature death, particularly among the elderly and those with respiratory or cardiovascular illnesses. The Knoxville region will have to come up with a plan for dealing with that problem.

—Joe Tarr