ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD

April

8,

1976

PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS,

)

Complainant,

v.

)

PCB75—95

75—118

STAR UTILITY COMPANY,

an Illinois

)

corporation, and MIDWEST UTILITY

)

COMPANY, an Illinois corporation,

)

Respondents.

INTERIM ORDER OF THE BOARD

(by Mr. Goodman):

This matter comes before the Board upon the Complaint of the

People of the State of Illinois filed by the Attorney General on

February 26,

1975.

The parties

in these consolidated cases are

the same, PCB75-95 concerning itself with the sewer system and

PCB75-118 concerning itself with the public water supply system

each of which is owned by Star Utility Company

(Star)

and operated

by Midwest Utility Company

(Midwest).

After generating more than 400 pages of transcript at three

hearings,

the parties herein entered into a Stipulation at a fourth

hearing held on March

4,

1976.

The parties

“..

.concluded that con-

tinued litigation of this cause would be protracted, unproductive,

time consuming,

extremely costly and not in the public interest..

they therefore entered into

a Settlement Stipulation wherein

neither Star nor Midwest admits any wrong doing or violation of

any law rule or regulation of the State of Illinois or of any of its

agencies.

In addition Star agrees to pay $1,000.00 and Midwest

agrees to pay $250.00

to the State of Illinois

in settlement of

this action.

The Board in the past has been inclined to look with favor upon

21—15

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—2—

proposed settlements for precisely the reasons indicated by the

parties herein.

The Board must nevertheless consider the effect of

any proposed settlement upon the environment and upon the ability of

the Environmental Protection Act to protect that environment.

In

this case,

the Stipulation says,

in effect,

that Star will continue

to do what they have been doing

in the past using the existing plant

facilities unless or until the Illinois Commerce Commission approves

an increased rate yielding revenue sufficient to cover the costs of

correcting deficiencies which they at the same time disclaim.

We

find the parties contentions

in this case untenable.

The Board

finds that the conditions of the Stipulation proposed

under

(b)

to be

a reasonable procedure to insure that no violations

of the Environmental Protection Act and the Board’s Rules and Regu-

lations occur in the future, whether or not they occurred in the

past.

The Board

cannot,

however,

accept,

as

a condition precedent

to compliance,

a rate increase depending entirely upon the decision

of the Illinois Commerce Commission.

The Board therefore rejects the Stipulation as presented by

the parties

at hearing on March

11,

1976,

and remands the matter

back to them for modification of the Stipulation or resumption of

the hearing.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

I, Christan L.

Moffett,

Clerk of the Illinois Pollution Control

Boar~,hereby certify the a ove Interim Order was adopted on the

__________day

of

,

1976 by

a vote of

~

Illinois Pollution

1 Board

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