Hawk Cove, Texas, December 6, 2023. We’re proud to mark a milestone in environmental partnership. Today the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality issued its Agreed Order in Docket No. 2021-0024-MWD-E, concerning the City of Hawk Cove’s wastewater treatment facility. By the Commission’s own list for the plant (regulated entity RN104265848), it is the seventh order since 2009.
Few small towns can point to a relationship this steady. The Commission put Hawk Cove on its agenda in 2009, 2010, 2012, 2013, twice in 2016, and again in 2023.
Highlights
- 2008-1821-MWD-E, Commission agenda April 22, 2009: $2,500
- 2009-1193-MWD-E, February 24, 2010: $3,575
- 2009-2074-MWD-E, July 25, 2012: $0
- 2011-1708-MWD-E, February 13, 2013: $35,790
- 2014-0755-MWD-E, July 6, 2016: $8,000
- 2015-0206-MWD-E, December 7, 2016: $44,850
- 2021-0024-MWD-E, November 29, 2023: $39,525
- Total: $134,240, across fourteen years of agenda dates.
The 2023 order is a model of flexible financing. Of the $39,525 penalty, the City “paid $890,” another $7,905 “is deferred,” and the remaining $30,730 “shall be paid in 35 monthly payments of $878 each” (order, page 1).
The order also lists what an investigator documented in a record review on November 19, 2020. TCEQ alleged that “the Morris Street Lift Station pumps were inoperable, and the Indian Trail Lift Station was only equipped with one operable pump,” and that “routine inspections of the collections systems, including the lift stations, were not conducted” (page 2). It alleged that discharge monitoring reports for February 2020 through September 2020 “were not submitted” (page 3), and that after the plant’s permit “expired on March 1, 2021,” the City “continued to operate the wastewater treatment facility without authorization” (page 3).
There is good news on security, too. TCEQ alleged that the Red Bird Lift Station “had a large gap between a portion of the fence and the ground” (page 3). The order recognizes that by October 18, 2021 the City had “implemented corrective measures at the Facility by modifying the fencing at the Red Bird Lift Station” (page 2).
As in any healthy partnership, the two sides see some things differently. “The occurrence of any violation is in dispute” (page 1), and “The Respondent generally denies each allegation” (page 4). The order “shall terminate five years from its effective date or upon compliance with all the terms and conditions set forth in this Order, whichever is later” (page 2).
We look forward to the next chapter.