House Co-Sponsorship Memoranda

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House of Representatives
Session of 2017 - 2018 Regular Session

MEMORANDUM

Posted:	February 22, 2018 10:47 AM
From:	Representative Jonathan Fritz
To:	All House members
Subject:	Increasing oversight over funding for Department of Environmental Protection regulatory programs

Please join me in cosponsoring legislation to provide greater oversight over the funding used for the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) regulatory programs. Governor Wolf has proposed a series of permit fee increases, including increasing the well permit fee from $5,000 to $12,500. The increased funds that would be generated from the Governor’s fee packages would be deposited into restricted accounts and, because of the way the restricted accounts are created, be available for use by DEP without annual budgetary oversight over the spending. In order to provide improved legislative oversight over these proposed actions, I am proposing to bring legislative oversight to DEP’s 10 restricted accounts in the General Fund. Rather than allowing all monies in these accounts to be available for use by DEP, this legislation would require the amounts appropriated out of the accounts to be set annually by the General Assembly. This preserves the principle of user-pays for these programs, while restoring proper annual review to the programs within the restricted accounts fund. I look forward to working with you to advance these important reforms.

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