The state Department of Agriculture is focused on finishing a new system for tracking safety violations at propane companies after a state audit released last week faulted the agency for failing to penalize rule-breakers.
In an interview Tuesday, state Agriculture Commissioner Steve Troxler said the full system of tracking violations and penalties will be finished within four months.
The deadline is new. The department started using the first phase of the tracking system in September, but there had been no certain date for completing the rest of it.
An investigative report from state Auditor Beth Wood's office was critical of the department for collecting only $4,100 in fines from Oct. 1, 2009, to Sept. 30, 2010, when investigators had found 7,466 violations at propane plants, trucks, dispensing stations and homes, some of them public safety hazards.
The audit highlighted to two companies that had hundreds of violations and had failed to resolve some of their problems despite repeated warnings.
The department could have sought about $2.5 million in fines, the audit said. If that much had been collected, more than $2 million would have gone to local schools.
In the months after the audit period, between November 2010 and February 2011, the division issued three penalties totaling $1,400 and collected $900.
"There are no excuses for not having this matrix up and running early - I admit to that," Troxler said. "But there were things along the way that caused it to slow down." Factors that extended the timeline included few employees with an already heavy workload handed an additional, complex task.
"We have a load to start with," he said. "We threw this in."
The "penalty matrix" the department is building will track violations and their severity, and it will let state officials know what penalties can be levied, said Stephen Benjamin, director of the department's Standards Division.
The program will automatically issue warnings or penalty letters and will make sure the division is consistent in the way it handles violators and fines, Benjamin said.
The Standards Division inspects propane facilities, trucks, homes and businesses. The 7,466 violations noted in the audit were less than 4 percent of the 218,000 items inspectors checked, department officials said.
Some of the violations were serious, Troxler said, but he noted there hasn't been a major propane accident in his two terms as commissioner.
Wood said she was disappointed that Troxler appeared to be downplaying the audit findings but appreciated that he was pushing the violation tracking program to completion.
"They want to reason with these companies to get them into compliance," she said. "When you walk into a plant and it has more than 340 violations, that shows you their system isn't working."
Troxler said the department's priorities are educating violators and helping them comply with the rules, but it will fine companies with major problems.
"We're going to make sure the law is obeyed," he said.
Troxler faulted the audit for not providing a more thorough description of how the department handles its regulatory responsibilities and for calculating maximum fines for each violation, which the department would not have sought.
"That's not the way we're going to operate," he said. "One thing I can guarantee you, we will never assess fines [based] on how much money we can raise for the school system."
