APCD Board of Directors Meeting of October 15, 2026

All right, good afternoon. I'd like to call to order the October 15th 2026 meeting of Santa Barbara County Air Pollution Control District Board of Directors. Madam Clerk can we please get a roll call please?

We have a quorum.

Okay, our first item of business today is closed session. Will Kirk please read the items into the record?

Certainly. Closed Session Item C1 Conference with Legal Counsel Anticipated Litigation Government Code Section 54956.9 Deciding Whether to Initiate Civil Litigation Two Cases Closed Session Item C2 Performance Evaluation Government Code Section 54957B1 Title Air Pollution Control Officer Closed session item C3, Conference with Labor Negotiators Government Code Section 549576A Unrepresented Employee Air Pollution Control Officer Agency Designated Representative Steve Labanino Board Chair and Jennifer Richardson District Counsel.

Okay Ms. Richardson any idea how much time we're looking at?

Chair Labanino, I think we're estimating about 45 minutes to an hour.

Okay so we will now adjourn the closed session. We'll be back in approximately 45 minutes

All

right, we're now going to reconvene from closed session. Ms. Richardson will you please report out?

Chair Lavagnino and Board of Directors, the board conducted a number of items in closed session today. Conference with legal counsel anticipated litigation under government code section 45956.9 two cases performance evaluation under government code 45957B1 of the air pollution control officer and conference with labor negotiators government code 45957.6A for the unrepresented employee position of air pollution control officer With the agency designated representative Steve Lavagnino, Board Chair and myself District Counsel.

In closed session the board authorized County Council to initiate litigation in two matters. The vote of the board was unanimous of all directors present. The action the defendants and other particulars shall once formally commenced be disclosed to any person upon inquiry unless to do so would jeopardize the agency's ability to effectuate service or would jeopardize the ability to conduct settlement negotiations to its advantage.

And that's all the reportable actions, thank you.

Great okay next item of business is the approval of the minutes of the August 20th 2026 meeting. Is there any discussion? Motion?

So moved. Second.

We can have a motion and a second clerk Roll call, is it? No. We just need a voice vote. All those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Passes unanimously. Right that takes us to our administrative items. Is there anybody from the public that has pulled any items they'd like to speak on?

Chair Levening, no members of the board, no public. Members have pulled any

items from the administrative agenda. Board members wish to pull any items for discussion or I could take a motion on the administrative agenda moved by Patino.

Second.

Second by Brown. All those in favor, aye. Any opposed? Passed unanimously that takes us to item F which is our director's report.

Alright good afternoon first off I would like to start with the introduction of a new hire Lucas Carnero He was hired June 2nd. He's a graduate from UC Santa Barbara, he graduated in 2018 with an environmental studies degree and he first entered the workforce as an intern with the Air District. He had a short stay with us is in our account accounting tech I believe before he got his Environmental Planner position with RENCON Consultants where he was working specializing on air quality, greenhouse gas emissions through the CEQA project process.

He returned thankfully to the Air District in June of this year as an Air Quality Specialist with our Planning Division. He now contributes to our CEQAs work Along with low-cost sensors and our Clean Air Ambassador and other education programs. Outside of work he enjoys photography, exploring local creeks and beaches with his two dogs and rock climbing in Santa Barbara and throughout the United States so welcome Lucas!

My next item is in regards to cannabis permit fees update. We held our Community Advisory Council meeting on August 27th and the district agendized an update on the fees associated with our post-harvest cannabis permitting program. As a refresher, when the district was working on revisions to our rule, our fee rule, Rule 210, a lot of public comment we received in that process was focused on our cannabis permitting program.

Because the permitting of cannabis facilities was relatively new at the time, staff pulled the cannabis fee schedule from the draft rule and instead proposed to move all cannabis permitting projects to cost reimbursement. When the CAC unanimously recommended the amendments to this rule and this approach for the cannabis they also asked that we return back to them with a report on how it's working once we had adequate information to assess So we were able to provide that presentation on, at August 27th with a summary of the typical cannabis permit and inspection fees. And we compared those to all the other industries that we permit. The key takeaway from the CAC update on average cannabis permit costs Cannabis permit costs less than district-wide average for all of our permits, so it's less than any of the other sources.

Cannabis permitting is a small share of the district workload making up about 2 to 5% of our facilities, permits, inspections violations and revenue. Cost reimbursement is working as its intended. It recovers our actual cost while keeping cannabis permitting fees moderate. Under the cost reimbursement model, the straightforward easy-to-permit facilities pay less. The more complicated facilities those that might have enforcement compliance challenges they pay more so it's not averaging out all those costs across the entire industry and it's definitely rewarding those that are more straightforward and within compliance of our rules Following the presentation, the CAC received one public comment and asked several follow-up questions. At the conclusion, the CAC was satisfied with our approach and they appreciated our efforts to report back to them.

It was interesting. We had one public comment speak and after that public comment, one of our CAC members said she was like well what can I do here? And what was recommended is that she apply for a CAC position as you recall we have a lot of vacant positions so we're proud to report she took us up on on that offer and we now have one additional CAC member from that activity so that will be nice to have her as part of the conversation

So be careful if you come to public comment.

You're

going

to

be on the board.

Yeah, we did get two new board members since our last CAC Council Advisory Council member since our last board meeting but we still have eight more vacant positions so if anyone has any ideas folks that might be of interest to volunteer their time and participate in the deliberations have them reach out to Lori. All right, the next area I have a PowerPoint presentation. It's on the Kiyama Clean Air Room Program. I'd like to share some photos of our very successful event that was held in Kiyama on August 2nd at the Kiyama Valley Family Resource Center As you know, this program provides free air purifiers to select communities. It has already occurred in Guadalupe and Old Town Goleta. Cuyama is the third community that we've been able to reach.

On October 2nd, we distributed 270 air purifiers to residents who live there. We were also able to provide Each classroom at the school district and the admin building with an air purifier, plus the post office library sheriff's department substation and fire station. And then we also were able to reach the Caltrans office it's there too so that was a good opportunity.

Air purifiers as you know it's a very important resource to have to ensure that your indoor air quality is as clean as possible when we're inundated with wildfire smoke The funding for this program was awarded or approved by your board in June of this year and paid out through the our clean air fund. So the next slide. This provides just some visualization of the Family Resource Center. It was very well decorated within the center and it was fun to be there. You could see our staff, we had a greeting table where folks were able to come in and we required a proof of residence so we provided postcards to everyone that had a P.O. box in the Cuyama area and also in the U.S. Postal Service rural route We posted on social media, we did as well as a family resource center and they also got the word out through three food distribution events.

So we got good outreach before the event and we were told you know when you came in you either had to have the postcard which a lot of folks did or you had to have some proof And Lori, thank you for being there. You were able to help us with Spanish-speaking individuals that came in and there were quite a few you are busy working so it was really nice to have Lori a part of this event to welcome everybody.

We did provide free food and snacks. When we had our event in Old Town Goleta, we were able to have a food truck which was awesome. Food truck out in Cuyambo is very expensive so we decided we're not going to go down that route. We're going to find another way to still make it festive and enjoyable. So we had snacks and fresh fruit and water for all that participated along with information in English and Spanish about how to create a clean air room.

That's the famous Bill Dillon entering the

office.

All

right so on the next slide, people were very positive to participate in the event and they were also energetic to provide some quotes. So for the next few slides we were able to get quotes from individuals who participated This fella, he was actually there an hour early. He works in Buellton is it the flag? The what's that you know Flying Flags. He works at Flying Flags and he was late to work but he goes can I please get it soon so I can get Flying Flags to do my job. I really want one of these. So he was very energetic All right.

So again I want to send out a special thank you to Lynn, Martha and Leti at the Kuyama Valley Family Resource Center. Martha and Leti were there all day rolling up their sleeves helping us move things around helping us confirm who's who's a resident and who's not a resident it was definitely a partnership with the family resource center We did successfully distribute 270 air purifiers. We did have additional that we were hoping we would give away, but Martha agreed to keep those there and work with the community past that one day event to reach more that weren't able to attend on the second.

So we are very thankful of this opportunity and we definitely hope we can do more in the future with the Kiyama family or Valley Family Resource Center. It was a huge success, so thank you! All right, next slide is all staff team building day. I just wanted to put a spotlight on this exceptional opportunity that SpaceX provided to us. It was on September 23rd. Air District staff were very fortunate to have a tour.

We, I originally thought it was going to be maybe a one and a half hour tour. It ended up being close to four-hour tour They gave us a red carpet when we were out there. They were generous with their time, generous with showing us different aspects of their operations. That even some of SpaceX's own employees had never seen before. One of their counsel was there and he didn't have the opportunity ever to see the satellite installation room before.

It was definitely a highlight for the staff that were able to participate. Originally, Dave was helpful reaching out being the main go-between with SpaceX and I think the number was around 20 staff total but we said no, we need more. We got it up to 30 so they even opened the number Participants that we were able to have. Welcome by staff. You know we live here, we see the launches but to see it up close and in person and the fine detail of their operation just gave us another appreciation for what's going on at that facility.

For me it was definitely the ride share satellite structure that I was most inspired by. The actual rocket that we were looking at included carbs tanninger two Satellite and I included Lauren Sanchez. She's the chair of the California Air Resources Board she posted on her social, and it's an entire video of the launch but I captured this lot because the the far satellite that's actually carbs tanning or to satellite that's being released And then and this is going to be used to monitor methane across the state This is a second Satellite they were able to launch for that purpose and we got to see it just two days before I went out there. So, um... I just thought that was pretty inspiring and just yesterday as a random coincidence We had a meeting with CARB staff on the implementation of their community engagement project for their satellite methane work so taking it even to the next step of this is what we're going to be doing in implementing that program here in our area All right, two more brief items.

The prescribed burn map we're working on this map it's going to be released later this month. It's going to be a resource where you can have air quality conditions as well as the specific locations of all the prescribed burns You'll be able to easily recognize when a prescribed burn is occurring or scheduled to occur. You'll be able to click on that fire icon and get all of the details, not only our community outreach efforts, our news releases and our media alerts but also the details that are pulled from the PFERS CARBS main database associated with the burn, how many acres, all the other conditions that are included in their smoke management plan. So I wanted to let you know that map's going to be released soon so stay tuned and we'll be able to provide you a presentation at our next board meeting on that.

And then last of the last for this board meeting, I wanted to recognize board members who will not be with us as an APCD board member going into the new year So I have three here that we have Yeti mugs and some candy in there. First off, thank you Director Rouse for your five years of service with the APCD. We have a beautiful You'll Never Forget Us. And you won't lose it because your name's on it as well. All right. And then

the next one

Director Chair Lavagnino, thank you for your 15 years of service. And then lastly, Director Al Clark, thank you for your 18 years of service from 2027 to 2010 and then 2013 to 2026. Thank you. That concludes my Director's Report.

All right, outstanding so is there I guess there is time for the members of the public to speak on items that oh that's that's for that Director's Report do we have any public comment on the Director's Report?

We do not have any.

I mean you do give me a whole thing here if all I have to do is read it This now qualifies me as Press Secretary at the White House. I can read it, all right. Okay that takes us to public comment period. Is there time for members of the public to speak on items that are not on the agenda? Do we receive any requests?

Chair Lavanino, we do not receive any request from the public to speak on items not on the agenda.

Awesome okay next item is discussion item H1 will the clerk please read that item into the record.

Certainly discussion item H1 adoption of the 2026 ozone plan. Consider recommendations as follows one hold a public hearing to receive public testimony on the 2026 ozone plan and the addendum to the final environmental impact report for the 2010 Clean Air Plan, and two adopt a resolution which includes the following action items 2a Find that prior to approving the 2026 ozone plan, board members have reviewed and considered the addendum to the final environmental impact report for the 2010 Clean Air Plan with the final environmental impact report for the 2010 Clean Air Plan.

2A adopts the California Environmental Quality Act CEQA findings including that subsequent environmental review is not required because none of the conditions in CEQAs guidelines section 15162 have occurred 2C adopt the 2026 ozone plan and 2D authorize the air pollution control officer to transmit the 2026 ozone plan to the California Air Resources Board and do all other acts necessary and proper to obtain approval of the 2026 ozone plan.

All right. This afternoon we'll receive a presentation from Tim Mitro, Air Quality Engineer in our Planning Division. It's all yours.

All right thank you Erin. Next slide Alex. So good afternoon members of the board so today we're going to be talking about the 2026 ozone plan. The ozone plan has seven chapters in total so I'll be guiding you through the key points of each chapter and we have about 15 slides so it'll take about 15 minutes to go through the presentation in total. Next slide.

So to begin with, Chapter 1 of the plan provides an introduction on ozone and why we're concerned about it. Ozone is produced by photochemical reactions between oxides of nitrogen and reactive organic compounds in the presence of heat and sunlight. NOx is primarily emitted from combustion sources while ROCs comes from combustion as well as evaporative sources like coatings and solvents.

The highest levels of ozone are typically occurred or witnessed during the afternoon hours between April and October as these are the months with the highest temperature and most daylight. The main reason we're concerned about ozone is because breathing it in can cause a number of health effects in broad segments of the population. Next slide. So our planning efforts are guided by the California Clean Air Act of 1988, which was enacted to start a new push towards reducing air pollution in California. The state adopted the one-hour ozone standard at that time of 0.09 parts per million and eventually a more stringent eight hour ozone standard of 0.070 parts per million. The one-hour standard addresses the peak hourly spikes, while the eight hour standard addresses the prolonged effects of ozone exposure as it looks at the average concentrations across eight consecutive hours.

To help the county attain both of these health-based standards, the district is required to assess the effectiveness of our program and evaluate strategies to obtain any needed emission reductions. Our original state plan was adopted back in 1991 and as long as we are in nonattainment, we are required to update this ozone plan every three years with new metrics and evaluations.

Currently the county is designated as non-attainment transitional, which is a subcategory of non attainment and this transitional designation signifies that the region is very close to attaining the ozone standards having three or fewer exceedances in a single year. Next slide. And all of the exceedance data can be found in Chapter 2. So this is one of our key charts that reflects the number of exceedances at all of the monitoring stations within the county for both the 1-hour and 8-hour state standards.

Back in 1991, we were seeing about 100 ozone exceedances of the stricter eight-hour standard. But over the last 35 years with new state and local regulations, ozone exceedances have decreased to near zero levels. There's clearly some variability year in and year out due to both weather and pollution events but the overall air quality trend is definitively downward.

The most recent exceedances occurred in calendar years 2021 and 2024, and those were at our Paradise Road monitoring station which is located a few miles east of Lake Kachuma. This Paradise Road station is what's driving our attainment status and keeping us in non-attainment transitional. But on a positive note, we've seen no exceedances so far in 2026. So we're on the path towards being in attainment once again.

The earliest potential change to attainment could be in January 2028, as it will still take some time for the California Air Resources Board to review all of our monitoring data including everything in 2026 and take formal action to redesignate the county. Next slide. Moving on to Chapter 3, we've provided an updated emission inventory for both ROC and NOx. So the mission inventory is broken up into four major categories. Stationary sources, area sources, on-road vehicles, and other mobile sources.

Though on these charts marine shipping is separated from the other mobile source category to make it easier to identify its relative impacts. The total countywide emissions shown here were calculated using the base year of 2023, which is the most recent and thoroughly reviewed inventory that is available for all the required analyses in this plan. On the ROC chart on the left, area-wide sources account for the largest portion of inventory with majority of that comprised of consumer products and pesticide usage.

As for the NOx charts, the story continues to be about marine shipping dominating the local inventory. These emission categories shown on the screen are the man-made emission sources that can be controlled and readily planned for. So, the analysis does not include any natural sources of emissions. Natural sources are still important though as wildfire events in California can cause pollution spikes and ozone exceedances. So if you're interested in reviewing any of that data we've attached more of it in Appendix A at the end of the plan.

Next slide. So using a model from CARB, we're able to show what the emissions were in the past as well as some potential projections of what they could be in the future. The future projections include various growth estimates for each industry and they also include control estimates that incorporate the existing regulations that have been adopted to date. This chart is showing the ROC trends for each sector and the total emissions in the county is shown in the gray series near at the top.

ROC emissions have been decreasing over time, and they're still projected to be on that downward trend. Chapter 3 also explains the rationale for some of the growth assumptions that are built into this chart and one of those topics is the planned decommissioning and removal of some of the offshore oil platforms in the region. These platform decommissionings will be large projects using industrial equipment which spans across multiple major source categories.

So we added these project emissions to the chart as a separate category, which we're showing as the green line near the bottom between calendar years 2030 and 2035. Next slide. And the same forecast analysis can be done for NOx. Just on this graph, we can see a lot more of the historical fluctuations in marine shipping emissions. Marine shipping has had steady growth in the 2000s, followed by a dip in 2009 due to the Great Recession.

And over the last 10 years marine shipping emissions have been declining partly due to the district's participation in the Protecting Blue Whales Blue Skies Vessel Speed Reduction Program. As for the future of marine shipping, the NOx missions are expected to stay relatively stable and then start decreasing in about 10 years due to fleet turnover and the usage of newer vessels with emission controls.

Next slide. Chapter 4 discusses the stationary and area source control measures. Since 1991, we've adopted 35 measures that have helped reduce the emissions from various source categories such as solvent usage, internal combustion engines and all the different types of boilers steam generators and water heaters. Historically, we've adopted all of these rules under the Every Feasible Measure Strategy to expeditiously attain the ozone standard.

This strategy requires us to look at the rules being implemented in other air districts and evaluate the magnitude of the emission reductions, the cost effectiveness and the feasibility of implementing the measures locally. Since we're so close to attainment, we're also required to consider the ozone exceedance trends and the current and projected emission inventory to help assess whether additional rules are necessary for attainment.

Based on our review of the potential measures and the data we've already presented in chapters 2 & 3 no additional measures are proposed for adoption within the next three year period So even though we're not looking to adopt new measures under this plan, this slide helps demonstrate the impact of the 35 measures that the district has already adopted. The scenario starts with the 2023 baseline inventory for both ROC and NOx shown in light blue but it excludes a few specific area source categories that are outside the district's regulatory purview.

The estimated emission reductions from the district's 35 control measures are then added to these baseline emissions. So about 8.7 tons per day of ROC and 4.2 tons per day of NOx, and that creates the dark blue estimates which represent an uncontrolled and unregulated scenario. So using this method, this uncontrolled scenario would have more than twice as many ROC emissions and three times as many NOx emissions.

This chart does not account for all of the district's programs that have helped reduce pollution but it does demonstrate why the district needed to adopt and maintain these 35 control measures. So Chapter 5 goes into more detail about the Transportation Control Measures or TCMs. TCMs aim to reduce the on-road vehicle emissions within the county by improving the existing transportation system, inducing people to change their travel behavior to less polluting modes, or ensuring new emission control technologies are expeditiously adopted.

SB CAG is responsible for developing new TCMs for the ozone plan. And even though no new two TCMs were incorporated into this plan, new projects continue to be implemented under the existing TCMs to satisfy the three objectives on this screen. On the graph on the right you can see the relative growth rate of vehicle miles traveled compared to the county population Vehicle miles traveled is one of the main indicators to help identify how well these TCMs are working, but it's also important to note that the trends are substantially impacted by the price of fuel, the overall economy and significant events such as the COVID-19 pandemic.

Within the last few years, we are starting to see the countywide VMT returning to the pre-pandemic levels. But if we're looking at the overall trend since 1990, the countywide VMT is growing slower than the overall population and part of that can be attributed to the successful implementation of TCMs. Next slide. Moving on to Chapter 6, we discuss the various grant and incentive strategies that the district implements to achieve additional emission reductions within the region.

These programs primarily retire older, higher polluting equipment and replace them with newer cleaner and cost effective alternatives. These grant and incentive strategies are funded through a variety of sources such as the Carl Moyer Program, the Community Air Protection Program, the Clean Air Fund, and DMV Revenue. Over the last few decades, the district has awarded over $60 million for projects that meet the program criteria, thereby reducing regional emissions and achieving community health benefits.

And finally, Chapter 7 focuses on the district's ozone attainment strategy which connects the key points from the previous chapters as well as further emphasizing the importance of the district's core programs. Some of the core programs that we haven't touched on yet include the district stationary source program that permits and inspects regulated facilities as well as the district's role in reviewing new projects that are subject to CEQA.

All of the eight key programs shown on the screen are critical to helping the county attain and maintain the state ozone standards into the future. However, the California Air Resources Board's mobile source strategy and their accompanying regulations are in a difficult situation at the moment due to the recent challenges by this federal administration. Specifically some of the CARB regulations have had their Clean Air Act waivers partially or fully disapproved which prevents CARB from enforcing the measures and will result in increased mobile source emissions across the state.

We will continue to track these ongoing legal battles between the state and federal government. But in the meantime, we will also focus on our mission and what we can control locally within the county. Next slide. So that covers all seven chapters of the Ozone Plan. Back in August, district staff presented the draft of the plan to the Community Advisory Council at a public meeting at the Buellton Library.

There, the CAC had an opportunity to discuss the materials and provide feedback And at the end of the meeting, the CAC members made a unanimous recommendation that the district board adopt the 2026 ozone plan. So staff's recommendation today is that your board adopts the resolution which includes all of the actions shown on the screen and that concludes my presentation back to you.

Any questions for staff? Director Clark

Thank you, thank you for your report. I'm sorry if I missed it but what's included in other mobile sources?

So other mobile sources includes a lot of the off-road equipment so you're thinking of like bulldozers for construction equipment or commercial harbor craft so anything that's not in the on road vehicle category is more of the off-road category.

I'm just curious like how we stack up compared to other counties and other districts.

So if we're talking about attainment across all 35 air districts, so what we're seeing in a lot of the coastal counties from here to the north like Monterey Bay and the Bay Area, a lot of them are also in the non-attainment transitional category for ozone as well. Due to

marine activity?

Partly due to marine activity. When you go into the far north California, northern California not much population up there so they are attainment but for everywhere in like the Sacramento Valley, San Joaquin Valley, South Coast AQMD Ventura they are still non-attainment for the state standards. All right

cool question Director Brown How far off are we from attainment? We have a NAT category, and you say we're close. How close is close? We're talking 0.07 parts per million.

So to be in attainment we have to have zero violations of the state standards within the last three year period. And with the most recent three year period, we had one exceedance at the Paradise Road monitoring station so it's just one hot stagnant day in the middle of summer where we you know got up to like 71 or 72 parts per billion, just barely over the standard.

And that's what's keeping us in this non-attainment transitional. So eventually that data will fall off and we're going to be looking at a new three year period from 2024 to 2026 and using that data if 2026 continues to remain clean, we more than likely will be designated as attainments.

So it's a rolling rolling every three years is your

We're in the important time right now. So far this year's been great

but we

don't want to jinx it.

The things that we missed, those were environmental issues with regards to smoke or wildflowers? Did we have any control on going outside the parameters

So when you have an exceedance, CARB can look at exceptional events for like wildfires back in 2010. We had six exceedances of the ozone standard and all those were caused by wildfires so if there is an event like that we could perform a report and submit it to CARB to get some of those datas thrown out of our attainment designation But for the one exceedance we had in 2024, that was just a hot summer day. And based off of the data on record, we could not throw out that exceedance.

I don't want to make it seem any worse but if you look at NOx, we have nothing – I mean, we do marine vessels but we don't really have the ability to – that's 73%. And then mobile is 11. We don't do that. And on road vehicles is 10 and we don't do that. We do stationary sources, which is 5%.

But it is exciting that our blue sky is now statewide and the number of vessels who are participating in their participation rate is getting better. So maybe that will be one of the deciding factors for us.

That'd be nice. Director Hartman?

I just think this was an excellent report. You clearly know this inside out and really appreciate it.

All right. Is there any public comment on this report?

Chair Labadino, members of the board we do not receive any public comment on this item.

Okay well we have yeah is there a motion on adopting the resolution? Adopting the ozone plan?

Move staff recommendation.

Second. Moving staff recommendations that's 2A through D So all those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? All right, excellent passes unanimously. So we just have a quick announcement this meeting is going to be rebroadcast on Sunday October 18th 2026 at 5 p.m. on Santa Barbara County TV channel 20 and we are adjourning until Well, yeah we'll probably have a special meeting in November so keep your calendars. We're looking at maybe doing a special closed session right after SB CAG okay so on the 19th of November all right?

All right that closes out this meeting.