Bifurcated Goals and Appropriate Evaluative Measures of Air Quality Programs: Examples from Ohio (draft)

Air quality programs, and their comparable namesakes, are but one small component of the extensive and sweeping federal Clean Air Act (CAA). Although these programs to warn the public of “poor air quality ” through episodic air quality alerts are voluntary, they are still considered part of the overall effort to achieve “clean air.” My assumption at the outset of this research was that the nature of these programs would likely assume two roles or identities-- a means to reduce emissions and aid in CAA compliance and as a public information campaign (PIC). Based upon analysis of the intergovernmental environment and the evaluative efforts of these programs, this assumption was ultimately borne out. With this in mind, the purpose of this project was twofold: 1) to examine whether Ohio’s programs, as a critical case, also operated with bifurcated identities and, and 3) to examine whether Ohio’s air quality programs are congruent with this intergovernmental environment. Based upon semi-structured interviews with representatives of Ohio’s air quality programs, I have uncovered evidence that these programs do, indeed, maintain goals, activities and evaluative efforts that result in the programs maintaining two distinct “identities. ” O