Building an Effective Environmental Enforcement Program (50m Lecture)

Education and enforcement provide the essential foundation for effective environmental health regulatory programs. Constructing and maintaining an effective enforcement program requires clear policies and procedures but also necessitates effective collaboration with community partners. The Salt Lake County Health Department provides the elements of both the structure of an effective enforcement program and of the approach to building community-wide partnerships in conducting environmental enforcement activities. Enforcement activities for environmental crimes have expanded over time without requiring increased agency staffing and resources in the health department by developing a formal collaboration with other agencies participating in the Environmental Crimes Task Force, a partnership sponsored jointly by the Health Department and the District Attorney’s office. The Task Force provides opportunities for sharing oversight of enforcement case actions, joint case review, planning, training, staff and other resources. The result has been the development of an expanded range of enforcement activities conducted by numerous agencies conducted within the framework of a community-wide approach to dealing with environmental crimes. This approach allows for agency partnerships across jurisdictional authorities and collaboration on enforcement activities while providing the necessary education and knowledge for staff from agencies outside of public health in dealing with environmental enforcement activities.