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Committee approves bill aligning state pipeline penalties with federal law
Summary
The Judiciary Committee voted to pass Senate Bill 9, which replaces state pipeline-safety civil-penalty amounts with the federal Pipeline Safety Act maximums so state penalties track federal changes.
The Judiciary Committee voted to approve Senate Bill 9, a bill that removes fixed state civil-penalty amounts for pipeline-safety violations and adopts the federal Pipeline Safety Act’s penalty levels.
Senator (sponsor) presented the bill and said the change replaces the current state caps — $100,000 per day and $1,000,000 total — with the federal structure so the state values will update automatically if federal penalties change. The sponsor said the federal maximums at the time of the briefing are $200,000 per day and $2,000,000 total.
Jason Montoya, pipeline safety bureau chief (agency staff), attended as an expert on the bill. Committee members asked no substantive questions during the hearing. Senator Stewart moved that the committee “do pass.” The chair asked if there were any objections; none were raised and the committee approved the measure for passage.
The committee did not record a roll-call vote in the excerpt. The bill will proceed through the legislative process according to the chamber’s rules.
