LAWMAKERS WANT BRAKES PUT ON SMOG PLAN.Byline: Associated Press Associated Press: see news agency. Associated Press (AP) Cooperative news agency, the oldest and largest in the U.S. and long the largest in the world. California's controversial ``Smog Check II'' program should be suspended until Jan. 1, 1998, to give the Legislature time to craft a better plan, a letter signed by 46 state legislators urges. ``Information from within Department of Consumer Affairs and information provided from private sources leads us to believe that Smog Check II has many problems and gaps that need to be addressed,'' the lawmakers said in the letter delivered Thursday to the state Bureau of Automotive Repair. But a bureau spokesman, Bob Brown, replied that ``suspending the program is not an option'' because of ``the draconian dra·co·ni·an adj. Exceedingly harsh; very severe: a draconian legal code; draconian budget cuts. [After Draco. sanctions California faces from the federal government'' if the air pollution abatement program is halted. ``If we don't meet federal standards, we face sanctions such as alternating drive days and the loss of billions of federal dollars,'' he said. ``We don't have the ability or authority to suspend the program.'' The Legislature enacted the new smog program in 1994 to meet tougher federal clean air standards and enforcement is set to begin next year. Smog Check II specifically targets so-called ``gross polluter'' vehicles, the worst 10 percent of cars, which are blamed for half of California's vehicular pollution. An owner of a gross polluter car could be compelled to make up to $450 in repairs to obtain a waiver to operate it for no more than an additional two years. Cars labeled gross polluters cannot be registered or legally driven until they are repaired or granted waivers. The program also had provisions, not yet finalized See finalization. , for the state to buy cars that cannot pass smog checks or to impound impound v. 1) to collect funds, in addition to installment payments, from a person who owes a debt secured by property, and place them in a special account to pay property taxes and insurance when due. them. A follow-up measure this year would repeal the impound authority. Other criticisms of the program include complaints of extremely long delays in getting inspections and charges that tests were designed to remove far more than the targeted 10 percent of the worst polluters from the road. Melanie Morgan Melanie Morgan (b. 1956 in Kansas City, Missouri) is an American radio host based at KSFO in San Francisco.[1] She has previously worked as a reporter for KGO-TV. She is the Chairman of Move America Forward, a non-profit organization that claims support for the U.S. of San Francisco San Francisco (săn frănsĭs`kō), city (1990 pop. 723,959), coextensive with San Francisco co., W Calif., on the tip of a peninsula between the Pacific Ocean and San Francisco Bay, which are connected by the strait known as the Golden radio station KSFO, one of the talk-show hosts organizing the protest, described the smog program as ``an oppressive smog policy based A decision made by any software application that is based on the policy (rules and regulations) of the organization. See policy and COPS. on bad science and flawed data.'' |
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