Senator Jeff Merkley is working on two bills to deal with smoke crisis

As wildfires burn throughout the state, Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley is working on two bills to deal with what he calls a smoke crisis.

The Smoke Ready Community Act would create grants to make air quality upgrades more accessible and provide more funding for infrastructure upgrades.

Those upgrades would include smoke filters in public buildings and more protective gear, like masks.

"The communities would decide what specifically they think would work best and for some it’s having gear ready to disburse which is a mask to help people keep smoke out of their lungs for others they’re really going to emphasize having spaces, whether it’s schools or public buildings where it’s highly filtered air," said Merkley.

The second bill, The Smoke Planning and Research Act, will provide federal funding toward research and development.

His plan includes creating four centers to research wildfire smoke. One of which would be at the University of Oregon.

"The University builds a huge network of individuals within the university outside the University with all the stakeholder groups by having continuous focus on developing and testing the strategies and that becomes very useful."

In addition, there would be $20-million in federal funding to the EPA to study the public.