TCEQ TO GET SERIOUS ABOUT COLLECTING FINES

By Ella Tyler

After the state’s new fiscal year begins September 1, applicants for permits, registrations, certifications, or licenses from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality must pay any outstanding penalties or fines before the application can be processed. The new policy applies to all entities with the same customer number and applies across media; for example, a delinquent air fee would hold up the processing of a water permit. Operating without the required permit, license, or registration from the TCEQ is violation of the law and the business could be subject to more fines. Applicants that are on a TCEQ-approved payment plan or in bankruptcy proceedings are exempt from the new enforcement procedure.

According to the TCEQ, an estimated $5 million of the $135 million invoiced by the agency in fiscal year 05 is still outstanding.

A report issued by the Galveston-Houston Association for Smog Prevention in December 2005 said that many local polluters get a break from the TCEQ when a penalty is assessed. The GHASP research showed that, in 26 enforcement cases handled by the commission during the past five years, TCEQ assessed only $470,065 in fines when it could have assessed $3,259,926. This is just 14% of the potential. The TCEQ was consistently lenient in the cases with the largest potential fines.

In a press statement announcing the TCEQs decision to enforce payment of fines, TCEQ commissioner Larry R. Soward said, “We make it very clear regarding what financial obligations are involved in conducting business with the TCEQ and now we are making the consequences of not taking responsibility for those obligations equally as clear.”

Delinquent applicants will have 30 days to pay their fines.