Adopted Parts 622, 620, 621, And 624 Assessment Of Public Comments
Adopted Parts 622, 620, 621, and 624 Assessment of Public Comments
Comment 1: The Honorable Steve Englebright, Chair of the New York State Assembly Committee on Environmental Conservation, and the Honorable Dan Quart, Assembly Chair of the Administrative Regulations Review Commission (Commenters), jointly submitted comments related to the amendment of 6 NYCRR 624.1(a)(6), specifically the sentence, "Unless otherwise required by law, when a request for a hearing is made by an applicant based upon department staff's denial of a permit or permit renewal application, participation at any hearing is limited to department staff and the applicant and the provisions of sections 624.3, 624.4, 624.5 and 624.11 of this Part shall not apply." The Commenters expressed concern that it is unclear whether this language only applied to permits that are not subject to Environmental Conservation Law Article 70 Uniform Procedures Act (UPA) or whether other permit programs are among the "include, but not limited to" language in the preceding sentence. The Commenters also expressed concern that the Department proposal inappropriately excludes public participation in permit related hearings.
Response to Comment 1: Thank you for your comment and concern regarding the proposed amendment. The purpose of the amendment to this paragraph was to provide a process when the denial of a non-UPA permit application or renewal application is based on violations of the law, regulations or permit conditions, which are similar to enforcement proceedings. The removal of the matter from public participation was unintended. We agree with the comment and accordingly have removed the sentence from the proposal to maintain the regulatory standard. The Department believes the language in 624.1(a)(6), in effect since 2006, expressly states the paragraph applies to non-UPA permits, and has been applied only to non-UPA permits as exemplified by the list in the paragraph. We have reduced the list to its original content.
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