The county is encouraging West Marin residents to apply for a woodstove rebate program funded by the Bay Area Air Quality Management District—especially those who live in areas deemed highly impacted by wood smoke particulate. The air district kicked off the rebate program about two weeks ago, with $3 million set aside to help homeowners remove wood stoves and replace them with natural gas or propane stoves or electric heat pumps. Although the air district’s website says there is a waitlist for the program, 40 percent of the funds are reserved for “highly impacted residents”—meaning those who live in designated high-impact areas like the San Geronimo Valley, people who earn low incomes and those for whom wood stoves are the only source of heat. And these types of residents have not been applying in large numbers, said Kelly Pennypacker, an intern with the Community Development Agency’s Sustainability Team. “That’s why we’re trying to reach out and make West Marin citizens aware,” she said. “We’re trying to reach out to people in highly impacted areas.” Successful applicants can receive anywhere from $750 to $12,000, depending on whether they are removing or replacing a stove and whether they are considered a highly impacted resident. Last year, the air district made rules for homes that source heat solely from woodstoves more stringent: those homeowners must replace their woodstoves with Environmental Protection Agency-certified stoves by Nov. 1 if they want to legally use them on “spare the air days”—days when soot forecasts are high and the air district enforces a 24-hour ban on wood burning. Applications are available at grantapps.baaqmd.gov.