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Committee approves study-and-exit process for Region 5 vehicle emissions testing area
Summary
Senate Bill 103, as amended, directs IDEM to evaluate ambient air quality and identify strategies to seek removal of Lake and Porter counties from the Region 5 containment emissions-testing area; the committee passed the amendment and advanced the bill 13-0.
Senate Bill 103, amended to set a process for evaluating ambient air and seeking removal from a multi-state containment area, passed the House Environmental Affairs Committee 13-0.
Sponsor Senator Niemeyer told the committee the proposal is intended to launch a state-led process, working with IDEM and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as needed, to seek removal of Lake and Porter counties from the Region Number 5 containment area that currently requires periodic vehicle emissions testing in parts of northwest Indiana.
"This amendment sets a process in place of how we can get out of this containment area," Niemeyer said, recounting that Lake and Porter counties have been subject to the testing program since the early 1990s. He said the current contract for testing costs about $24 million every four years and that monitoring is coordinated with nearby states.
Witnesses told the committee residents view the program as onerous and uneven because vehicles that travel into the testing zone but are registered elsewhere are not subject to the tests. Representative Carolyn Jackson described a constituent's experience with a vehicle that repeatedly failed a test until the manufacturer intervened.
Jake Tory, legislative director for IDEM, told the committee IDEM supports the amended bill and that the agency intends to complete a comprehensive evaluation of ambient air quality and identify pollution-reduction strategies by the end of the calendar year. "We believe that we will be able to carry this out," Tory said.
Rick Cockrum, representing Lake County through TAM Capital Group, said toll-road traffic passing through the region likely contributes to the area's readings and said low-income residents and seniors are disproportionately affected by testing and repair costs. "If this can move forward to study the data and come up with a solution, the county's in favor," he said.
The amendment removed a narrowly tailored senior-exemption study from the bill and replaced it with a broader, agency-driven evaluation and a formal process to pursue removal from the containment area. Committee members expressed bipartisan support for pursuing a process to seek removal, with one member calling it "an idea whose time has well gone." The committee adopted the amendment and voted 13-0 to pass the bill as amended.
Under the amended measure, IDEM will perform a comprehensive ambient-air evaluation and identify pollution-reduction strategies to help the area meet National Ambient Air Quality Standards; the bill sponsors said federal coordination will be required to change the area's status.
With committee passage, the bill moves on in the legislative process; IDEM and the sponsor said they expect further work with federal partners and local governments as the evaluation proceeds.
