Opinion ID: 1723059
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: whether the trial court erred by entering an injunction prohibiting the mississippi department of environmental quality and the mississippi environmental quality permit board from proceeding with any permitting procedures regarding hazardous waste treatment facilities, rather than enjoining only the portion of those proceedings involving the invalidated capacity assurance plan.

Text: Governor Fordice, as well as DEQ and the Permit Board, argues that the injunction entered in this case exceeded the scope of this litigation. They argue that the injunction should be modified so that DEQ and the Permit Board can complete tasks necessary for processing hazardous waste treatment facility applications that do not involve the use of the CAP. In issuing the injunction, the court reasoned that DEQ and the Permit Board could not process applications because § 17-17-151(3) requires, as one part of a five-part analysis, that the permits be evaluated for compliance with the CAP. Miss. Code Ann. 17-17-151(3) provides: The Permit Board shall consider the following factors in evaluating the need for the proposed facility: (a) The extent to which the proposed commercial hazardous waste management facility is in conformance with the Mississippi Capacity Assurance Plan and any interstate or regional agreements associated therewith; (b) An approximate service area for the proposed facility which takes into account the economics of hazardous waste collection, transportation, treatment, storage and disposal; (c) The quantity of hazardous waste generated within the anticipated service area suitable for treatment, storage or disposal at the proposed facility; (d) the design capacity of existing commercial hazardous waste management facilities located within the anticipated service area of the proposed facility; and (e) the extent to which the proposed facility is needed to replace other facilities, if the need for a proposed commercial hazardous waste management facility cannot be established under paragraphs (a) through (d). The governor, DEQ, and the Permit Board, argue that only one of the factors involves the use of the CAP, DEQ and the Permit Board should be allowed to proceed with the permitting processes, as it relates to the non-CAP factors. This argument appears to have merit. While it is true, as plaintiffs assert, that information in the CAP and the criteria for permitting overlap, it is clear that there are statutory tasks to the process which are independent of the existence of a CAP. That the CAP reflects those same tasks is a function of the fact that the CAP itself is an agreement to do what the statute authorizes. In other words, the CAP reflects the comprehensive state plan. The state plan is also reflected by a series of statutes assigning particular tasks. Except to the extent that they are statutorily circumscribed, the assigned agencies perform those tasks without regard to the CAP. The Permit Board in particular is directed to perform tasks, one of which involves a consideration of the CAP itself as opposed to the independent elements which comprise the CAP. It is the CAP which is challenged, not the elements reflected therein, statutory or otherwise. It follows that an injunction which goes beyond use of the CAP is overbroad.