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Pollution Control urges training, career ladders and reinspections after $1M+ in fines
Summary
Interim PCS director Jesse Dickerman said chronic turnover and stretched field teams limit enforcement capacity. He asked court members to prioritize training, investigator career ladders and funding to reinspect concrete batch plants after ~600 inspections and over $1,000,000 in fines between 2020 and 2025.
Jesse Dickerman, interim executive director for Pollution Control Services, told commissioners that turnover has been a persistent drain: the department averaged turnover exceeding 25% between 2021 and 2025, leading to 91 separations while the team averaged roughly 70 FTEs. "We need a training budget," Dickerman said. "We need investigator II/III career ladders and formal training programs so staff can reach full competency in 12 to 18 months."
Dickerman described the concrete batch plant program as a priority for reinvestment. "With a couple of FTEs, the department conducted almost 600 inspections between 2020 and 2025," he said, and noted the program resulted in more than $1,000,000 in fines over the last two years (some fines split with the state). He asked for funding to reinspect a subset of roughly 140 batch plants to measure whether compliance improved and to inform data-driven enforcement going forward.
On water and wastewater, Dickerman said county services are filling gaps where state agencies do not act, creating a gray area that PCS treats as a court expectation. He called for cross-department collaboration on failing municipal utility districts (MUDs), possible lab consolidations with Public Health, and legislative changes to give the county clearer authority when small districts fail.
