ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD
October 17, 1996
FOX POINT HOMEOWNER’S
ASSOCIATION,
Petitioner,
v.
ILLINOIS ENVIRONMENTAL
PROTECTION AGENCY,
Respondent.
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PCB 97-73
(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)), Fox Point Homeowner’s Association (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 was filed with the Board by the
Agency on October 15, 1996. Pursuant to Section 35(b) of the Act, the Board must issue the
variance within two (2) days of this filing. The Agency, by and through its Director, Mary A.
Gade, seeks a provisional variance to allow petitioner to continue its dredging operation at
Lake Louise.
Specifically, the Agency recommends that we grant petitioner a 45-day provisional
variance for its Will County facility from the total suspended solids effluent requirement, as
set forth in 35 Ill. Adm. Code 304.124(a) and State Water Control Permit No. 1995-EA-5341.
This variance period shall begin on the date in October 1996 when the petitioner resumes
discharging from the settling pond, and continue until the dredging project is completed, but
not longer than 45 days.
The Agency recommends that the Board grant the requested provisional variance with
specified conditions and agrees that the repairs are necessary. The Agency anticipates that the
requested provisional variance would have minimal environmental impact on the receiving
stream and is unaware of any public water supplies that the requested provisional variance
would adversely impact. According to the Agency, no federal laws would be violated if the
provisional variance is granted by the Board. The Agency believes that a denial of the
requested provisional variance would create an arbitrary or unreasonable hardship on the
petitioner.
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
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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 304.124(a) and State Water Control Permit No.
1995-EA-5341 as they relate to total suspended solids, on the following conditions:
1. The term of this provisional variance shall commence on a date in October 1996
when the petitioner resumes discharging from the settling pond, and continue
until the dredging project is completed, but not longer than 45 days;
2. During the term of this provisional variance, petitioner shall meet a daily
effluent concentration limits of 150 milligrams for total suspended solids.
Petitioner shall stop dredging operations if sample results exceed the 150
milligrams daily maximum for total suspended solids effluent concentration
limit;
3.
Petitioner shall notify Mark T. Books by telephone at 217/782-9720, or
facsimile at 217/782-9891, with the total suspended solids monitoring results on
a daily basis, when discharging from the settling pond. In addition, petitioner
shall each day provide the Agency with an assessment of any impact of the
discharge to the lake. If the discharge causes substantial impact on the lake, the
Agency, at its discretion, may require that the dredging operations be suspended
until the situation resulting in the impact is resolved
;
4.
The petitioner shall notify Karen Katamay of the Agency’s Maywood Regional
office by telephone, at 708/338-7900, when dredging operations begin and
again when the dredging operations are completed. Petitioner shall confirm this
notice in writing within five (5) days, addressed as follows:
Illinois Environmental Protection Agency
Attention Mark T. Books
Division of Water Pollution Control
Compliance Assurance Section
2200 Churchill Road
P.O. Box 19276
Springfield, Illinois 62794-9276
5. The petitioner shall operate its confined disposal facility in such a manner so as
to produce the best decant water practicable. This shall involve the excavation
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of a pumping pit for the decant pump intake, and suspending the intake as close
to the water surface as possible; and
6.
Placement of peat and sediment materials excavated from the settling pond
cannot cause odor or water quality problems.
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:
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 97-73, October 17, 1996.
_____________________________________
Petitioner
_____________________________________
Authorized Agent
____________________________________
Title
_____________________________________
Date
IT IS SO ORDERED.
Board Member K.M. Hennessey abstained.
I, Dorothy M. Gunn, Clerk of the Illinois Pollution Control Board, hereby certify that
the above order was adopted on the _____ day of ___________, 1996, by a vote of
______________.
___________________________________
Dorothy M. Gunn, Clerk
Illinois Pollution Control Board