ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL

BOARD

August

3,

1995

COUNTY OF VERMILION,

Complainant,

v.

)

AC 95—39

(County No.

95—03)

ILLINOIS LANDFILL,

INC.,

)

(Administrative Citation)

Respondent.

CONCURRING OPINION

(by J.

Theodore Meyer)

I concur with the majority’s opinion and order

in this case;

however,

I believe that attorney’s

fees and costs should be

included in all penalties imposed in administrative citations.

Section 42(f)

of the Environmental Protection Act

(Act)

provides that the Board may award costs and reasonable attorney’s

fees in cases brought on behalf of the citizens of Illinois.

(415

ILCS

5/42(f)

(1992)).

This section should be construed

broadly and include administrative citation penalties brought by

the State,

or by any unit of local government vested with the

authority to impose such citations, pursuant

to Section

4(r)

of

the Act.

In addition to reasonable attorney’s fees and costs,

indirect expenses such as travel

time,

administrative support,

printing,

copying and overhead should also be pursued.

After

all,

the time spent by complainant’s attorney in prosecuting this

matter certainly could have been used to handle other matters.

Also,

the

now common practice by state and local governments of

charging

a “user

fee” to those who use

a service

(such as paying

for photocopies)

is certainly a cost that should be imposed on a

party who has violated the Act.

This case presented an

opportunity for the complainant

to submit an affidavit of all

costs,

and

I believe that the Board should have taken this

opportunity to reimburse the county.

In this case,

the administrative citation neither requests

the imposition of such costs and fees nor explains whether some

percentage of costs and fees was figured into the penalty.

Attorneys’

fees and costs incurred during the administrative

citation process should be pursued on behalf of the Illinois

taxpayer,

and I urge the parties to bear this

in mind in future

negotiations

in this case.

~

~

~r

Member

---

I, Dorothy M.

Gunn,

Clerk of the Illinois Pollution Control

Board,

here4y certify that the above concurring opinion was filed

on the

~

day of

_______________,

1995.

Illino

ion Control Board