The state’s health department has the authority to take enforcement action against counties for their toxic landfills, the Colorado Supreme Court decided last week, dismissing the argument from La Plata County that the state could not force it to clean up its long-shuttered and polluted landfill.
In reaching their conclusion, the justices declined to answer whether counties have “personhood” under the Solid Wastes Disposal Sites and Enforcement Act. A lower court had determined the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment’s ability to order a person or “association of persons” to comply with the law could, in fact, apply to counties.
The Court acknowledged “the potential unintended consequences of deeming a county an ‘association of persons,’ given the many times that associations of persons are identified throughout the Colorado Revised Statutes,” wrote Justice Richard L. Gabriel in the June 7 opinion.
Although local governments may authorize the operation of landfills, the Court affirmed that the state has an “ongoing regulatory role” should the locality decide to permit such a facility. Gabriel rejected La Plata County’s argument that the decision showed a distrust of local governments’ ability to enforce environmental laws.
Multiple entities, including the Colorado Chapter of the Sierra Club and Colorado Counties, Inc., filed briefs with the Supreme Court in support of one side or the other. Michael Foote, an attorney for the Sierra Club’s state chapter and a former state senator, praised the justices’ affirmation of CDPHE's role over landfill cleanups.
"We are pleased this decision keeps an effective environmental enforcement system for solid waste landfills in place,” Foote said. “Relying on just one jurisdiction to enforce environmental standards does not always lead to good results."
According to CDPHE, more than 100 currently-closed landfills ceased operations in the 1980s and 1990s because of an inability to comply with new federal regulations without significant investment. As of July 2018, counties owned approximately 106 of the 133 closed landfills.
A spokesperson for the department said it would continue its push for all facilities to be in compliance with the solid waste act, regardless of whether their owners are public or private entities.
La Plata County’s solid waste disposal site in Bayfield, which operated until 1994 and was home to 100,000 cubic yards of municipal waste, contained excessive levels of vinyl chloride, a gas associated with increased cancer risk. CDPHE and the county worked to clean up the site until approximately 2016, when the state decided more aggressive remediation efforts were necessary.
"La Plata County has failed to comply with the ground water protection standards at the relevant point of compliance for the Facility and prevent water pollution at or beyond the point of compliance," the department wrote in its March 2016 order. It directed the county to abandon certain wells and install new ones to better understand the extent of the vinyl chloride plume.
La Plata County balked, and argued the state’s governmental immunity law prevented the department from issuing a compliance order against the county.
Furthermore, the county asserted, the solid waste act only applied to “persons,” of which the county was not one.
In March of last year, the Court of Appeals sided with the health department, finding not only that a county could reasonably fall under the definition of a person or an association of persons, but that the legislature never intended to shield government-owned landfills from enforcement under the solid waste act.
“A different interpretation of ‘person’ would create an absurd result by allowing counties to avoid complying with the SWA and to evade oversight by the Department,” wrote Judge Terry Fox in the appellate court's opinion.
Upon review, the Supreme Court walked back the Court of Appeals’ finding that counties were persons, while at the same time upholding the broader conclusion that the General Assembly intended to include government-owned landfills under the state’s environmental enforcement mechanism.
“Here, it is undisputed that counties own the great majority of landfills throughout Colorado. In these circumstances, it would be illogical and absurd for us to conclude that counties are exempt from the regime of statewide regulatory enforcement set forth in the SWA,” Gabriel wrote for the Court. “Assuredly, the legislature did not create a statewide regulatory regime for managing solid wastes and then exempt most landfills from the reach of that regulation.”
The justices also decided the state’s governmental immunity law, which limits the ability to hold government entities civilly liable, did not block the state from taking regulatory action against a public nuisance like the Bayfield landfill.
The department reported sending 36 compliance advisories to counties since 2016, notifying them of potential rule violations at solid waste facilities.
La Plata County did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Colorado Counties, Inc., which represents 62 of the state's 64 counties, told the Supreme Court that it would cost counties billions of dollars to address CDPHE's compliance orders, which have tripled between 2012 and 2020.
The case is Board of County Commissioners v. Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.
"case" - Google News
June 15, 2021 at 03:30AM
https://ift.tt/3q65TgZ
Supreme Court sidesteps 'personhood' issue in resolving La Plata County landfill case - coloradopolitics.com
"case" - Google News
https://ift.tt/37dicO5
Shoes Man Tutorial
Pos News Update
Meme Update
Korean Entertainment News
Japan News Update
Bagikan Berita Ini
0 Response to "Supreme Court sidesteps 'personhood' issue in resolving La Plata County landfill case - coloradopolitics.com"
Post a Comment