Environmental Remediation through Supplemental Environmental Projects and Creative Negotiation: Renewed Community Involvement in Federal Enforcement

Abstract

Traditionally, federal environmental enforcement actions have had two goals-mandatory compliance with statutory standards, and punitive monetary penalties to deter future violations. Protracted litigation has generally been the tool used to achieve these goals, requiring substantial time and money. However, such "end-of-the-pipe" regulations have failed to address issues of pollution prevention and remediation in the areas harmed by environmental violations. This comment argues that a more effective means of federal enforcement can be achieved through the use of creative settlement techniques that employ supplemental environmental projects to address pollution prevention and community remediation. These projects allow enforcement agencies to go beyond the limitations of traditional enforcement methods by keeping penalty dollars local to benefit the communities harmed by environmental violations, while still holding accountable the violating palties.