California Water System Fined Half a Million Dollars

SAN JOSE, California, May 28, 2004 (ENS) - Federal District Court Judge Jeremy Fogel has issued an order imposing the largest penalty ever against a public water system in the United States. The case involves privately owned drinking water companies serving 28,000 consumers in Salinas and other parts of Monterey County, California.

Alisal Water Corporation, related companies, and Robert and Patricia Adcock, the individual owners of the systems, were ordered to pay a penalty of $500,000 for violations of the federal Safe Drinking Water Act.

The federal government originally filed the legal action in 1997 alleging that the companies submitted false drinking water reports to state and local regulators in the early 1990s.

The State of California asked the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to intervene and bring an action against Alisal Water Corporation and the related companies. Under the federal Safe Drinking Water Act, the U.S. retains the right to enforce the Act even when the state has primary enforcement responsibility.

In 2000 and 2001, while the case was pending before the court, two of defendants’ small systems, the Moss Landing and Vierra Canyon Water Systems, experienced boil water orders extending for months.

Government inspections of the water company facilities at this time and defendants’ inability to resolve the boil water orders quickly led the federal government to seek to have the companies put in receivership and sold to reputable water purveyors.

After trial in early 2002, the court agreed with the federal government and appointed a receiver to take over all but one of defendants’ systems. In April of this year, the Court ordered the systems in receivership sold to a number of different water companies. The sales are pending.

Judge Fogal wrote that the high penalty, ordered on May 20, was warranted “in light of the number and nature of violations at issue, Defendants’ repeated refusals to cooperate with regulators over a span of years, the serious risks to public health and the fears and inconvenience imposed upon thousands of Defendants’ customers.”

The court found that the violations spanned a decade and that defendants conduct reflects "a persistent pattern of non-compliance with the most basic responsibilities of a public utility.”

“This case is an example of how the federal government can work together with state and local governments in enforcing environmental laws,” said Thomas Sansonetti, assistant attorney general for environment and natural resources. “The Justice Department was able to provide the resources to bring the action in federal court and convince the judge of the need for extraordinary relief."

"The EPA will continue to be vigilant in ensuring that Monterey County residents have water safe to drink at all times," said Alexis Strauss the EPA's water division director for the Pacific Southwest region. "The county, state and EPA together pursued these violators to ensure false test results and other violations were exposed."