Antonovich Blasts AQMD Proposal as ‘Draconian’ : Environment: Supervisor says clean-air plan will hurt working people and small businesses. He will ask agency’s board to delete several measures.

County Supervisor Mike Antonovich, in his role as a member of the South Coast Air Quality Management District board, on Wednesday criticized as “Draconian” the clean-air plan that is scheduled for a vote July 12.

The plan also was attacked in April by environmentalists, who said it was too weak to sufficiently reduce health-threatening air pollution.

At a downtown news conference, Antonovich and nine business and labor leaders led the charge from the opposite flank, contending that the plan would hurt working people, small business and local governments. “The economic base of our communities is threatened by the district’s bureaucratic tentacles. . . . Nobody escapes from the Draconian regulations,” Antonovich said.

The AQMD staff projects that under the plan, the region’s 5 million jobs would increase by 3 million over 20 years--but an average of 57,000 additional jobs a year that otherwise would be created would be lost because of the costs of cutting smog.

Antonovich said he will ask his colleagues on the AQMD board to delete several measures. He singled out requirements for ride-share programs at high schools and colleges, and for construction of showers and bike racks in new commercial buildings as examples of impractical regulation.

The ride-share programs will hurt working students who commute to class, Antonovich said. An aide, Debra Jasgur, said after the news conference that bike racks and showers are the type of decisions that should be made by local governments rather than the AQMD.

Antonovich also said rural views will be affected by a proposal to pave dirt roads, firebreaks and parking lots to keep dust out of the air.

And he noted that one recommended rule is designed to control “emissions from livestock waste,” which the AQMD staff says is a source of particulate matter that can carry toxics into the lungs and contribute to haze.

“What are we going to have to do? Put diapers on cows?” Antonovich quipped.

He said he also will seek postponement of the most costly measures.

Antonovich is the most ardently pro-business member of the AQMD board. He noted, however, that he should not be dismissed as an extremist. Several causes he championed during debate over the 1989 clean-air plan--from buybacks of old “junker cars” without smog controls to trading of pollution rights--have been incorporated into the updated 1991 version.

“Initially, these ideas were met with skepticism and not taken seriously,” Antonovich said. “But we have seen in the past two years a dramatic shift toward embracing these basic principles.”

Among those at the news conference in support of Antonovich were Matt Fong, a member of the state Board of Equalization; prominent attorney Dan Garcia; Kelly Candell, representing the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, and Ray Remy, president of the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce.