Remember when you were little and you had the power of invisibility? Remember that? It was so easy too. You just had to place your tiny hands over your closed eyes and poof – you were gone. I so good at it; and sometimes, I would even spread my fingers just a bit and open my eyes just for a moment, and still maintain my invisibility! My mother was excellent at finding invisible people of course, but still …I know it worked.
Too bad it doesn’t work anymore. But it would appear that some people think that it does. i often meet people that will say some variation on the above, and clearly they interpret the EPA’s lack of direct contact as something similar to the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval. Hmmm, could be. After all, the Ohio EPA has thousands of permit holders to oversee, and a physical presence, an actual in-person review of every single site every year or even every five years would be difficult without somehow disturbing the space – time continuum. The EPA will even tell you, it’s true , they would love to personally review everyone, every five years, but they can’t as they have neither the budget nor the time machine to do that work.
However, they do have your monthly reports. And self reports (or lack thereof) supply a lot of information to people whose job it is to protect our air, land and water. And in most instances the operator of record would be informed. But it is possible, violations are stacking up and no letter of informal enforcement was ever sent or that a less than forth coming operator may not have informed you the letter was received. There is a good chance that you will not find out you ever even had a violation until you renew your permit, at which point you may need to answer for all of them. Let’s hope your operator was keeping accurate, complete records for the five year period between renewals.
Let’s face it; there are certain permit holders that are always going to have greater scrutiny. Your company does chrome plating you say? I am willing to bet you have had more visits by the EPA than the mobile home park down the street with ten residents. Also if you serve food, discharge directly into a scenic waterway, state or federal park or handle lots of “bad” chemicals, you are also more likely to be looked at. But the EPA doesn’t have to meet you to be monitoring you, and just because you haven’t heard from them doesn’t mean that you haven’t violated the Clean Water Act and everything you do, following regulations or flouting them, is copacetic. The truth be told, the EPA will check in with you eventually. That is responsibility of the agency. And that responsibility is in effect even if your tiny hands are over your eyes, and you aren’t peeking the tiniest bit.