Funds back info, air cleaner efforts
Clean Air Methow has received more than $350,000 in state and federal grants to help Okanogan County residents prepare for wildfire smoke and reduce year-round smoke pollution. The funding will also make indoor air cleaners available for free to people who can’t afford them.
Clean Air Methow, a program of the Methow Valley Citizens Council, received a state grant of $282,000 from the Washington Department of Ecology for a communications campaign promoting preparedness for smoke pollution from wildfires and other sources throughout the county.
The campaign will be designed to inform residents about ways to protect themselves from unhealthy air, said Liz Walker, strategic adviser for Clean Air Methow.
“It’s mostly about protecting health, because there’s nothing we can do about wildfire smoke,” Walker said. “During wildfire season, smoke is everything anyone can think or talk about,” but once fires are over, people are eager to “move on,” she said.
“We want to put air quality on their radar throughout the year in a way that motivates behavioral change,” Walker said. The information campaign will seek to raise awareness among Okanogan County residents of year-round air quality concerns.
It will include messages focused on issues like outdoor burning of yard wastes and smoke from wood stoves, both contributors to unhealthy air quality, Walker said. The goal will be to reduce sources of smoke that can be controlled.
Clean Air Methow partners with other organizations to reduce year-round smoke exposure by providing alternatives to outdoor burning with free yard waste disposal events, and administering a woodstove exchange program. The Washington Department of Ecology has renewed a woodstove exchange contract with Clean Air Methow for 2022-2024, which should enable the replacement of 40-50 old, smoky woodstoves in Okanogan County.
Walker said a Spokane-based communications company will work with Clean Air Methow and other interested organizations in Okanogan County on the new communications campaign to deliver messages through schools, health and social service providers, newspaper and radio ads, billboards and social media.
Distributing air cleaners
A second grant secured by Clean Air Methow will fund distribution of 250 indoor air cleaners to people who are most susceptible to health impacts from smoke but can’t afford to purchase a cleaner. The $75,000 Environmental Justice Grant is from the federal Environmental Protection Agency.
To distribute the air cleaners, Clean Air Methow will partner with network of care providers including Okanogan County Heath, Confluence Health, Family Health Centers, Room One and Methow Ready/Aero Methow Rescue Service. The air cleaners will be available through those organizations, Walker said.
The indoor air cleaners, which can filter smoke from the air in a room and provide safe place when outdoor air quality is unhealthy, are intended for people who feel they can’t afford to purchase one, Walker said. She hopes the program will also increase awareness and encourage people who can afford an air cleaner to buy one. Clean Air Methow encourages local hardware stores to stock air purifiers, which are in high demand during wildfire season, Walker said.
Currently, Okanogan County does not have any public buildings “that can guarantee clean air when wildfire smoke is bad,” so distributing air cleaners for home use is an important way to help people limit smoke exposure, she said.
During a period of extreme wildfire smoke pollution last August, 2,000 air filters that were donated by the Instant Brands corporation were distributed in the Methow Valley by Clean Air Methow and local government and nonprofit organizations.
In addition to the distribution of indoor air cleaners this year, the Environmental Justice Grant will fund training for health professionals about the impacts of wildfire smoke, who is most vulnerable, and ways to help people limit smoke exposure.
Outreach will include disseminating a “smoke-ready checklist” that includes preparations such as ensuring access to clean indoor air, gathering N95 masks, and considering ways to provide support during the isolation of an extended smoke episode, such as checking in on neighbors or friends.
Okanogan County has a long history of wildfires and wildfire smoke, and fire seasons are becoming longer and fires more severe. The region is also impacted by increasing amounts of prescribed burning, conducted by land management agencies to restore forest health and reduce the risk of catastrophic wildfires. The county also has a longstanding winter air pollution issue, with inversions holding smoke close to the ground.
“Some of us are highly tolerant of smoke, but if you ask anyone with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, a parent of a child with asthma, or an elderly person, wildfire smoke and even the air quality changes from a neighbor burning outdoors, or winter woodsmoke settling in the valley overnight, can have significant health consequences,” Walker said.
“All of us deserve to have access to clean indoor air to stay safe, especially in our homes. These grants will help make that possible for more of Okanogan County.”
