Mandatory Minimum Penalties

CCKA Is Taking Action

CCKA works regularly to improve the level, targeting, and transparency of state law enforcement activities.  Firm, equitable enforcement both improves water quality and ensures fairness to businesses that follow the law.  CCKA has developed an online interactive map (displayed below) to help the public and agencies track and improve compliance with water quality laws.  This tool maps all dischargers within the state’s nine Regional Water Boards that have been issued “mandatory minimum penalties” (MMPs) in the ten years since the laws setting these minimum penalties took effect.  State data shows that 734 facilities merited 27,761 MMPs from January 2000 through April 2011 in the nine Water Board Regions.  Within California's 6 coastal Regions, 538 of these facilities account for 16,809 of the total statewide MMPs.  In other words, the majority of MMPs occur along the coast; 74% of violating facilities are located in coastal Regions, accounting for 60% of all MMPs statewide.  CCKA’s interactive map illustrates the number of these citations over the last ten years for each facility, highlights where facilities have no recent violations, and provides other information to allow communities to have more information about enforcement activities in their area.  Violations related to sewage releases, industrial wastes and contaminated groundwater most frequently caused the issuance of MMPs statewide.

AB 1104 (1999, Migden) and SB 709 (Comm. on Budget, 1999), as amended by SB 2165 (2000, Sher), established MMPs for violators of waste discharge requirements in order to respond to a lack of effective penalties being issued by the State and Regional Water Boards.  MMPs are issued for “serious” and “multiple chronic” violations, as described in Water Code Sections 13385 and 13385.1 and as implemented through the state’s recently-updated Enforcement Policy.

Coastal Mandatory Minimum Penalty Violations in California, 1/1/2000- 5/1/2011

Click to choose Map of Violations in Your Water Board Region:

1: North Coast    2: San Francisco Bay    3: Central Coast                            
4: Los Angeles-   East  Central  West          
5: Central Valley-   Redding  Sacramento  Fresno                                                     
6: Lahontan    7: Colorado River Basin    8: Santa Ana    9: San Diego     
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