Smoking Vehicle Program

About the Program

Category: County Resiliency (Best in Category)

Year: 2023

Following a hiatus of the original smoking vehicle program, the Smoking Vehicle Program 2.0 (SVP 2.0) launched in September 2022, to help Broward County reach its new net zero emissions goal. It leverages Broward County Code, Section 27-175(j), which prohibits “smoking vehicles” and thus targets the transportation sector – Broward County’s main source of air pollution and emissions. Not only does this help mitigate the effects of climate change, but it also safeguards the health and well-being of Broward County’s residents and environment. The program functions on a public reporting system to identify smoking vehicles operating on Broward County roads, with the goal of having the owners of such vehicles fix them to reduce the amount of air pollution being emitted. Once received, complaints can result in a courtesy letter or warning notice being sent to the smoking vehicle’s owner, which could eventually escalate to citations in certain cases. In its first four months SVP 2.0 has demonstrated success through the number of smoking vehicle complaints received. As such, this program presents a novel solution that could easily be replicated by other local governments in states which do not have mandatory emissions testing but may still face issues with air pollution from transportation.