The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection announced that two New Jersey companies have agreed to pay a total of $67,500 in Solid Waste Abatement Fund penalties in order to settle appeals of civil penalties assessed in November 2002 for waste transportation violations in southwestern Pennsylvania.
AWF Trucking of Kearny, N.J., has paid $33,000; and Pontie Disposal Co., also of Kearny, has paid $7,500, with another $27,000 to be made in payments over the next several months. Both companies agreed to withdraw appeals before the Environmental Hearing Board.
The agreements resulted from accelerated waste transporter inspections and enforcement operations conducted by the Southwest Regional Office and Pennsylvania State Police (PSP) in Somerset, Cambria and Westmoreland counties. DEP and PSP Troop A targeted transporters frequenting several landfills because of a continuing pattern of noncompliance with the state’s Solid Waste Management Act and Motor Vehicle Code. The large majority of the PDC and AWF violations were documented at Mostoller Landfill in Somerset County.
DEP’s Southwest Regional Office has finalized a total of $94,750 in Solid Waste Abatement Fund penalties in four actions taken in November 2002. A fifth action resulted in a final $33,000 judgment against Euro Trucking of Newark, N.J., and ultimately cost the company its Act 90 authorization to transport waste within the Commonwealth.
Three other transporters paid a total of $42,700 in fines at three regionally targeted landfills earlier in 2002. These landfills include Mostoller Landfill, Laurel Highlands Landfill in Cambria County and Greenridge Landfill in Westmoreland County.
An additional $25,000 has been collected so far in 2003 in three separate actions involving Act 90 violations at the same sites. Of that amount, $20,000 was received from penalties associated with violations stemming from the acceptance of unauthorized vehicles at Greenridge Reclamation and Mostoller landfills.
The civil actions supplement 653 citations filed by DEP inspectors at the three targeted landfills in 2002. So far, an additional $138,680 has been collected to date on the citations.