The City of Kingsville has received a notification of 11 violations at the landfill site and a fine of $88,350 by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) requiring corrective action by city officials immediately.

In response to the notification, City Manager Carlos Yerena said Tuesday that all the violations have been corrected and the landfill is back in compliance.

The notification was received by the city when a letter, dated May 17, was sent by TCEQ to Kingsville Mayor Sam Fugate and Dianne Leubert, City of Kingsville Solid Waste Superintendent, citing the violations, and city officials were told they had 60 days to respond with documentation describing their corrective action.

The TCEQ letter stated, “These violations were discovered during an investigation conducted on August 11, 2009, and documented in a letter dated September 11, 2009, from

Fines the TCEQ Corpus Christi Regional Office.”

The letter also read, “Please find enclosed a proposed agreed order which we have prepared in an attempt to expedite this enforcement action. The order assesses an administrative penalty of $88,350, which identifies the violations that we are addressing, and identifies any specific technical requirements necessary to resolve them.”

According to the letter, these steps include publishing notice of the proposed order in the Texas Register, and scheduling the matter for the city commission’s agenda.

“We believe that handling this matter expeditiously could save the City of Kingsville and the TCEQ a significant amount of time, as well as the expense associated with litigation,” Tim Haase, Manager of TCEQ’s Enforcement Division stated in the letter.

The violations and their designated fines according to TCEQ are as follows:

• Failed to maintain and operate the working face in a manner to control windblown

solid waste, litter was scattered throughout the facility-$1,550 • Failed to maintain at least 12 inches of suitable earthen material and to provide effective

stability to top dome surfaces and external embankment side slopes during

all phases of landfill operation-$11,625 • Failed to maintain visibility of all required landfill markers-$3,875 • Failed to conduct monitoring of landfill gases on a quarterly basis-$3,875 • Failed to retain all results from gas and ground monitoring in the operating record

within seven days of completion or receipt of data record-$7,750 • Failed to maintain personnel training records, the records did not contain required

training in communications in the event of an emergency, storm water pollution

prevention plan, and shutdown practices-$1,550 • Failed to provide all weather roads from the facility to access public roads-$3,875 • Failed to follow the construction specifications for the installation of groundwater

monitoring wells-$3,875 • Failed to comply with permit requirements by failing to insure that the leachate

collection system remains in good working order. Specifically, the digital panels on the sumps were inoperable. Failed to have a composite liner and leachate collection system that is designed and constructed to maintain less than a 30-cm depth of leachate over the liner. Also failed to meet the minimum frequency for quarterly

measuring of leachate levels. Monitoring had not been conducted since December

2008-$15,500 • Failed to provide controlled access to entire facility by means of artificial or natural

barriers or a combination of both. The three stranded barbed wire fence on the

east property line was down on the ground-$3,875 • Failed to prevent disposal of municipal solid waste in an unauthorized area. Specifically,

approximately 720,000 cubic yards of brush has been disposed in the

undeveloped Sector 5 unit, east of the designated brush unloading area-$31,000

A letter from the city of Kingsville with documentation was received by TCEQ on June 10, according to Andrea Morrow, TCEQ’s media contact.

As a way to offset a portion of the penalty, a “Supplemental Environmental Project,” which is a project that benefits the environment, could also be implemented by the city, Haase said.

Yerena said the city plans to appeal the $88,350 fine because all the problems have been corrected and everything is in working order, and if there are still any remaining issues then the city was looking to do an environmental project.

“First of all, the $88,350 is just the figure that they are looking at, and at this point we are mitigating that and secondly, even if the city had to pay any sort of fine, we have the option to do the environmental project and are looking at the demolition of lead based painted homes, which are some of the older homes that are eyesores in the community,” Yerena said.

Yerena said that his staff is currently in contact with TCEQ to address the violations and fines.

“Every single one of those items has been corrected at this point and we don’t agree with the fine because everything has been addressed and the landfill is running great right now,” Yerena said.

Yerena also said that the city has made improvements to the landfill recently on its own for the betterment of the community.

“We have gone beyond compliance and what TCEQ mandates,” Yerena said. “The city has been out there and doing many improvements not only because of TCEQ but because we want to do them and we want it to look nice,” he said.

“For example, we put in a litter fence on the perimeter of the landfill costing $63,000 on our own not because TCEQ wants it,” the city manager said.

The next step will be determined after the appeal process is completed and depends on whether or not the city’s request is accepted or denied, he said.

The inspection process typically begins with a facility inspection by TCEQ and if violations are determined, then the investigation reports are sent to the enforcement division, who in turn, notifies the entities. The enforcement coordinator may ask for more documentation.

“This matter is currently in the enforcement process,” Morrow said.

Penalties are assessed on many factors including the duration of the problem, how quickly the violations are corrected, and the impact on public health.

“If violations are not fixed, the penalties can be very severe,” she said. “What we are mostly concerned with is not so much the fines but the compliance of the city for overall better environmental health.”