COUNTYWIDE FOCUS : Gov. Wilson Honors Air Quality Program
Sponsors of a fund to improve air quality in Ventura County have been honored by Gov. Pete Wilson’s office, which lauded the fund as an innovative partnership between business and environmental concerns.
The fund, which officials believe is the only one of its kind in the state, provides cash for projects that range from buying buses that run on natural compressed gas to providing environmental lessons and videos for high school classes.
Honored for their part in creating the fund were Richard Baldwin of the county’s Air Pollution Control District; Kevin Rubey of the 3M Co. in Camarillo; Robert Paulger of Procter & Gamble in Oxnard; and Kate McLean of the Ventura County Community Foundation.
The 3M Co. donated $1.5 million in July, 1991, to create the fund, which is administered by the Ventura County Community Foundation. The money came from proceeds 3M collected when it sold air-pollution credits to Procter & Gamble.
The sale allowed the Oxnard paper-goods manufacturer to double its plant and hire 220 new workers. And the sale of the emissions credits resulted in a net decrease in air pollution, said Baldwin, the county’s air-pollution officer.
In a statement by Wilson issued Friday for the presentation of the award at the Los Angeles Museum of Science and Industry, he lauded the initiative for “cultivating both jobs and environmental protection.”
The Ventura County fund was one of 12 winners chosen for environmental awards out of 70 projects nominated statewide, officials said.
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