BILL ANALYSIS
AB 2900
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Date of Hearing: April 1, 2008
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENTAL SAFETY AND TOXIC MATERIALS
Jared Huffman, Chair
AB 2900 (La Malfa) - As Amended: March 24, 2008
SUBJECT : Mandatory Minimum Penalties for Waste Discharge
Violations: Time Limit
SUMMARY : Sets a 12-month time limit for the imposition of the
mandatory minimum penalty (MMP) of $3,000 for specified
violations of waste discharge requirements. Specifically, this
bill : exempts from the MMP a violation for which an action to
impose the MMP is not requested by the regional or state water
board or a superior court within 12 months of the board(s)
learning of the violation.
EXISTING LAW , the Porter-Cologne Water Quality Act,
1. Authorizes the State Water Resources Control Board and
the California regional water quality control boards to set
waste discharge requirements.
2. Provides for the imposition of civil penalties for
specified violations. The penalties may be issued
administratively by the state or regional board, or through
the superior court.
3. Establishes a mandatory minimum penalty (MMP) of $3,000
for each serious waste discharge violation, as defined.
This may be in addition to other penalties and fees.
4. Provides for specified exemptions to the MMP, including
if the violation is due to, for example, an act of war, a
natural disaster, or a testing period for a new or
reconstructed wastewater facility.
FISCAL EFFECT : Unknown; potential loss of penalty revenue to
regulatory agencies.
COMMENTS :
1. Purpose: According to the author's office, the bill is
necessary because "there are no time limits set in law for
the assessing of penalties for wastewater violations.
AB 2900
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Regional water boards can wait indefinitely to asses a
fine, by which time, significant penalties may have
accumulated. Many local public agencies have been hit with
sizeable penalties". The author's office has provided
several examples of sizable MMPs assessed on smaller agency
treatment facilities.
2) Background: State and regional water boards are tasked
with ensuring that wastewater discharge standards are met
by local wastewater treatment facilities. Testing and
monitoring occurs regularly. As part of the enforcement
scheme, boards impose a variety of penalties when serious
discharge violations are discovered. Enforcement policy of
the regional boards is to issue MMPs within seven months of
the time the violation is discovered.
3) Mandatory Minimum Penalty: The MMP program was enacted
in 1999 (SB 709, Committee on Budget and Fiscal Review,
Chapter 93, Statutes of 1999). Subsequent measures have
attempted to revise and reform the program. The MMP
program is complex. For example, an MMP would not apply to
an incomplete report but would apply to a failure to
report.
4) Support: The Regional Council of Rural Counties states
that the MMPs are "particularly troublesome for small
communities [who have] limited budgets, and are especially
hard hit if there has been a delay between the violation
and the assessment of penalties."
5) Effect of Time Limit on MMP: It is unclear how this
twelve month cut-off for MMPs would affect compliance by
the wastewater treatment facilities. Would imposition of
the MMPs become more difficult as facilities attempted to
prove that the enforcement agency did not meet the time
standard? It might be possible that delays could occur
because of court backlogs, through no fault of the
enforcement agencies. When does the twelve month clock
start ticking? Two agencies with the same sets of
violations might receive very unequal penalties, because
one was fined 11 months after the violation and one was
fined 13 months after the violation. The MMPs disappear
after 12 months.
6) Proposed Committee Amendment: The committee may wish to
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cap the MMP only for agencies whose violations were
inadvertent.
7) Related legislation:
AB 1946 (Nava) revises the collection method for MMPs.
The bill has been doubled
referred to Judiciary and the ESTM committees.
SB 1153 (Aanestad) makes technical changes in the MMP
program and is still in the
Senate.
8) AB 2900 has been referred to the ESTM and Judiciary
Committees and if approved by
this committee then it will proceed to the Judiciary
committee.
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION :
Support
Regional Council of Rural Counties
County of Nevada
Opposition
None received.
Analysis Prepared by : Kate Riley / E.S. & T.M. / (916)
319-3965