ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD
April 3, 1997
VILLAGE OF FAYETTEVILLE,
Petitioner,
v.
ILLINOIS ENVIRONMENTAL
PROTECTION AGENCY,
Respondent.
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PCB 97-172
(Provisional Variance - Water)
ORDER OF THE BOARD (by C.A. Manning):
Pursuant to Section 35(b) of the Environmental Protection Act (Act) (415 ILCS
5/35(b)), the Village of Fayetteville (petitioner) has requested that the Illinois Environmental
Protection Agency (Agency) recommend that the Board grant a provisional variance from
Section 35(b) of the Act (415 ILCS 5/35(b)), to the petitioner. Such request for a provisional
variance and the notification of recommendation were filed with the Board by the Agency on
Tuesday, April 1, 1997. Pursuant to Section 35(b) of the Act, the Board must issue the
variance within two (2) days of this filing.
Pursuant to Section 35(b) of Act (415 ILCS 5/35(b)), the Agency, by and through its
Director, Mary A. Gade, seeks a provisional variance to allow petitioner to continue to operate
its wastewater treatment facility while repair work is sequentially conducted on its lagoon and
rock filter.
Specifically, the Agency recommends that we grant petitioner a 45-day provisional
variance for its St. Clair County facility from the total suspended solids and biochemical
oxygen demand effluent discharge requirements, as set forth in 35 Ill. Adm. Code 304.102(a)
and 304.141(a) and imposed by National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System Permit
(NPDES) No. IL0020893. This variance period shall commence during 1997 when the lagoon
and rock filter are removed from service and shall continue until the work on the units are
completed, but not longer than 45 days.
The Agency recommends that the Board grant the requested provisional variance with
specified conditions. The Agency agrees that the repairs are necessary and anticipates that the
requested provisional variance would have minimal environmental impact on the receiving
stream. The Agency is unaware of any public water supplies that the requested provisional
variance would adversely impact and maintains that granting a provisional variance would
violate no federal laws. The Agency believes that a denial of the requested provisional
variance would create an arbitrary or unreasonable hardship on the petitioner.
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Provisional variances are by their very nature temporary. The responsibilities of the
Agency and the Board in these short-term provisional variances are different from the
responsibilities in standard variances. (See 415 ILCS 5/35(b) & 36(c).) In provisional
variances it is the responsibility of the Agency to make the technical determinations and
finding of arbitrary or unreasonable hardship. The Board’s responsibility is to adopt a formal
order, to assure the formal maintenance of the record, to assure the enforceability of the
variance, and to provide notification of the action by a press release.
Having received the Agency recommendation that a denial of the requested relief would
impose an arbitrary or unreasonable hardship, the Board hereby grants the petitioner a
provisional variance from 35 Ill. Adm. Code 304.102(a) and 304.141(a) and NPDES No.
IL0020893, on the following conditions:
1.
The term of this provisional variance shall commence during 1997 when the
lagoon and rock filter are removed from service and shall continue until the
work on the units are completed, but not longer than 45 days, whichever occurs
first.
2.
During the variance period, petitioner shall meet monthly average effluent
concentration limits of 77 milligrams per liter (mg/l) for total suspended solids
and 50 mg/l for sampling at biochemical oxygen demand. Petitioner shall
continue to meet the additional limits of its NPDES Permit No. IL0020893.
3.
The petitioner shall notify Eric Merz at the Agency’s Collinsville Regional
Office by telephone, at 618/346-5120, when the lagoon and rock filter are
removed from service and again when the units are returned to service.
Petitioner shall confirm this notice in writing within five (5) days, addressed as
follows:
Illinois Environmental Protection Agency
ATTN: Mark T. Books
Bureau of Water, Compliance Assurance Section
2200 Churchill Road
P.O. Box 19276
Springfield, Illinois 62794-9276
4. The petitioner shall operate its plant during the term of this provisional variance in a
manner that assures the best effluent practicable. Additionally, petitioner shall
perform the necessary repair work on the lagoon and rock filter as expeditiously as
possible to minimize the time period that the units are out of service.
The petitioner shall execute a copy of a certificate of acceptance of this provisional
variance and forward that copy to the Agency addressed as is the written notice required in the
above condition; the petitioner shall forward that copy within ten (10) days of the date of this
order of the Board, and the certificate of acceptance shall take the following form:
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CERTIFICATION
I (We), _________________________________, hereby accept
and agree to be bound by all terms and conditions of the order of the
Pollution Control Board in PCB 97-172, April 3, 1997.
_____________________________________
Petitioner
_____________________________________
Authorized Agent
_____________________________________
Title
_____________________________________
Date
IT IS SO ORDERED.
Board Member Kathleen M. Hennessey abstained.
Section 41 of the Environmental Protection Act (415 ILCS 5/41 (1994)) provides for
the appeal of final Board orders to the Illinois Appellate Court within 35 days of the date of
service of this order. The Rules of the Supreme Court of Illinois establish filing requirements.
(See also 35 Ill. Adm. Code 101.246 “Motions for Reconsideration.”)
I, Dorothy M. Gunn, Clerk of the Illinois Pollution Control Board, hereby certify that
the above order was adopted on the _____ day of ___________, 1997, by a vote of
______________.
___________________________________
Dorothy M. Gunn, Clerk
Illinois Pollution Control Board