ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD
    October 2, 2003
     
    PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS,
     
    Complainant,
     
    v.
     
    ROBERT HAMM d/b/a THREE R’S PIER
    BUILDERS,
     
    Respondent.
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    PCB 03-128
    (Enforcement - Water)
     
    DISSENTING OPINION (by W.A. Marovitz):
     
    The $2,500 civil penalty agreed upon is, under these circumstances, unconscionably low.
    I therefore respectfully dissent from the majority decision accepting this proposed settlement.
     
    Ten thousand gallons of
    untreated sewage
    was discharged into Fox Lake because
    respondent severed a sewer line. The proposed settlement is silent, however, as to cleanup, if
    any, of the resulting water pollution. Before excavating, respondent failed to contact the Village
    or Joint Utility Locating Information for Excavators (J.U.L.I.E.) about possible underground
    structures. This is shocking, especially for someone in the business of designing and
    constructing breakwalls and piers.
     
    The purposes of the Environmental Protection Act (Act) (415 ILCS 5 (2002)) are plain:
     
    [T]o restore, protect and enhance the quality of the environment, and to assure
    that adverse effects upon the environment are fully considered and borne by those
    who cause them. 415 ILCS 5/2(b) (2002).
     
    With the environmental harm and lack of diligence in this case, a mere $25 penalty for
    every 100 gallons of untreated sewage released into the lake does not further the purposes of the
    Act. That is the ultimate measure of any Board order adopting a proposed settlement.
    See
    Chemetco, Inc. v. IPCB, 140 Ill. App. 3d 283, 288, 488 N.E.2d 639, 643 (5th Dist. 1986)
    (settlement assessed on whether it promoted “the primary goal of the Act[:] the enhancement of
    the environment”). The parties’ assertion that a $2,500 penalty will deter future violations by
    this respondent and others similarly situated strains credulity. For these reasons, I dissent.
     
    W.A. Marovitz
    Board Member
     
     
    2
     
    I, Dorothy M. Gunn, Clerk of the Illinois Pollution Control Board, certify that the above
    dissenting opinion was submitted on October 2, 2003.
     
    Dorothy M. Gunn, Clerk
    Illinois Pollution Control Board
     
     

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