Emphasis Shifts on Clean-Air Rules : Environment: Business leaders persuade county supervisors to call for voluntary compliance first.

Buffeted by business community objections to proposed restrictions on employee commuting, the San Diego County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday steered its staff toward encouraging voluntary compliance with new traffic reduction rules instead of imposing punitive mandatory regulations aimed at cleaning the county’s air.

The board delayed a Sept. 17 public hearing on the rules to compare them with less strict proposals formulated by the San Diego Assn. of Governments, regulations that Air Pollution Control Officer R.J. Sommerville considers inadequate because they are voluntary.

Also, without specifying how it should be accomplished, the supervisors made clear that proposed Air Pollution Control District regulations should be increasingly geared toward giving businesses a shot at voluntarily increasing participation in car pooling, mass transit and other alternatives to the automobile.

“It’s quite clear that this board prefers a voluntary approach if possible,” Supervisor Brian Bilbray said.

“I think the first step . . . is voluntary,” Supervisor Susan Golding added. “The community has to buy in to controls to protect the environment.”

Warning of drastic changes in the San Diego lifestyle, the supervisors stressed, however, that, if voluntary measures fall short of compliance goals, backup mandatory regulations must be in place to accomplish clean-air goals and prevent state and federal air pollution agencies from withholding highway funds or levying other penalties.

The APCD already has relaxed proposals to bring the county in compliance with tough federal and state clean-air legislation. The agency’s original proposal called for mandatory parking fees to be levied on all solo commuters by their employers when the program goes into effect in 1992.

But, after complaints from businesses during a series of hearings on the regulations in May, the proposed fees were delayed until 1994 and modified so that employees of firms nearer to their traffic-reduction goals will pay lower fees.

The proposed rules still call for mandatory employer subsidies for employees’ transit fares, or car pool and van pool costs, as well as reimbursements for employees who walk or bicycle to work.

“It’s much more flexible than the original proposal,” Sommerville said Tuesday. “It substantially reduces the front-end impact and puts it way down the line. And the board wants us to make it even more flexible.”

Under the stringent state clean-air laws, the county must achieve an average of 1.5 riders per vehicle during rush hours by 1999, slow the rate of increase in passenger vehicle trips and trip length by 1997 and show no net increase in vehicle emissions by 1997.

Employee commutes, which average 1.2 riders per vehicle, are responsible for a third of the county’s daily automobile trips, more than half the miles driven and nearly 40% of the emissions spewed into the air by motor vehicles.

Sommerville said his staff will review ideas to further emphasize voluntary compliance, perhaps including further delays in the parking fees. But he said that, “with a more voluntary front-end (of the plan), I suspect there’s not going to be much progress during that time.”

The supervisors also ordered Sommerville to assess whether the APCD should match a $50,000 offer from the Greater San Diego Chamber of Commerce to conduct a study of the regulations’ effect on the economy. The chamber also wants to compare the rules’ cost-effectiveness with the reduction in pollutants.

The chamber, which wants to see some of the burden for air cleanup shifted to other drivers, contends that the new rules will cost the business sector $50 to $150 million annually by the year 2000.

“Despite these incredible costs, with their attendant burdensome regulations, there is little indication that the proposed plans will resolve the region’s air quality issue,” Bob Cerasoli, chairman of the chamber’s air quality committee told the supervisors.