Delayed post (sorry!): VC meeting agenda, Recap of EC tire-burning forum

I meant to post this on Saturday, but didn't--sorry!

Dear People: I'll be in the Emporium today (Saturday)--12noon-1pm. VC meeting on Tuesday 9/2--7 pm Bryan Ctr.

VC: We will be voting on an emergency ordinance regarding our budget appropriations, a resolution regarding "Clean Ohio" (urging state funds being appropriate to municipalities for brownfields), and a resolution accepting our current rates/tax budget.

Then we'll be discussing Domestic Partnerships and getting an update on the Village Manager search.

EC: We had a great forum on the issue of tire burning on Thursday. On behalf of the EC, I would like to thank everyone who came out for the event. Here's EC chair Bob Moore's assessment:

'We had teary-eyes pregnant moms, an emotionally- shaking pathologist from Miami Valley, upset organic farmers, well dressed physicians dangling tomatoes, ordinary folks, Obama supporters anxious to see their candidate, and a packed room. We had numbers from both sides and Doug Bailey counted 95 people" flowing out into the hall in the Standing Room Only crowd.

One positive piece of information that I learned: I did not realize that RAPCA has a monitor for our air quality located right at the Bryan Center--as well as in Xenia, Dayton, Moraine, Springfield, and Preble Co. Yellow Springs is one of the few places in the region where the air has not been over federal Clean Air limits in the last two years, staying (just barely) under 35 ppm of particulates (34.75). I'd encourage data people in particular to look over the data available at the RAPCA website: http://laa.co.montgomery.oh.us/air_quality/air_quality_data.htm

Two concrete outcomes of the forum:

• First, the RAPCA rep agreed to collect data specific to WHOLE tire burning prior to the tests (which will not be conducted until 60 days after CEMEX alerts RAPCA), because audience members are concerned that tire-derived fuel--tires that have been shredded and processed prior to burning--is not the same as burning whole tires.
  
• Second, the EC agreed to have a follow-up forum at some point in the future, where we hope there will be more time to compare the burning of tires more directly to the burning of coal/petroleum coke, which I have to admit is no more attractive to me at many levels. So I really do want answers to questions--I'm really uncertain about what is
  

The EC are a fairly young commission that's just getting some good experience, and we do realize that there were some glitches that we're hoping to address; we've already been asked by Bob to make lists of what we'd do differently next time. (When we chose this date about two months ago, we weren't even thinking about the Democratic national convention, sorry! Luckily, Obama didn't speak until 10 anyway.) We're thinking about altering the format in small ways to make the question period more efficient. And maybe we'll try to get a bigger space and microphones next time.