The TCPA law requires that all facilities be inspected annually. A 42 percent cut would reduce current inspections from 80 percent to less than half of all facilities, reducing oversight and increasing the chance of chemical accidents. A 36 percent cut to a program to protect firefighters and provide chemical risk information to workers and communities. The Worker and Community Rightto-Know program is designed to infonn workers and communities of health and safety hazards associated with chemicals and help local firefighters prepare for fires. Recent chemical fires in Hackensack and Lodi illustrate the critical life and death importance of RTK information to firefighters.
Cuts reduce the availability and quality of information to workers, communities and firefighters.
Elimination and reduction of routine water quality, coastal and shellfish monitoring. Due to lack of funds for labor or lab analysis, monitoring of non-point source water pollution would be eliminated. NPS is a major source of pollution and a critical competent of the new watershed management approach. Monitoring of toxic discharges from industrial facilities to wastewater treatment facilities would be eliminated. This monitoring measures the effectiveness of industrial pre-treatment requirements designed to reduce the toxicity of sludge and water discharges by wastewater facilities.