Each responds to different political pressures so they do not necessarily approach their jobs the same way:
From the Texas Tribune:
From the Texas Tribune:
In the 1950s, decades before LeRoy Melcher became a well-known real estate tycoon and philanthropist, he opened his first shopping center on San Felipe Road in the River Oaks neighborhood.
It was a modest 12,000 square feet, with a convenience store at one end, and at the other, a shoe repair shop. Tucked in between was a dry cleaner.
Sixty years later, it sits in one of Houston’s most expensive neighborhoods and has become the epicenter of a contentious debate over the enforcement of the state’s environmental laws.
On one side is Harris County, which blames the Melcher family and its tenant, River Oaks Cleaners, for a toxic plume of chemicals detected beneath the property. The plaintiffs are seeking penalties of between $50 and $25,000 per day going back nearly two decades – up to roughly $173 million.
On the other side are Melcher’s heirs, who have refused to settle for anything more than $1. LeRoy Melcher, who died in 1999, and his wife donated millions to charities and the University of Houston, which has three buildings on campus bearing their names.
The legal battle has become a flashpoint for some Republican lawmakers and business leaders in Texas, who think local governments shouldn’t be leading the charge to prosecute the Melchers — or anyone else — over violations of state law. In such cases — including this one — the state must join the case as a plaintiff.
And from Houston Public Media:
Darryl Tate is following his nose down a dead end street in a mostly industrial area in northwest Houston.
“I know the winds are out of the north today,” Tate said.
What’s blowing in the wind is important because Tate investigates environmental complaints for Houston’s Bureau of Pollution Control and Prevention. He came here to see what stinks.
“This is the facility here, we are on the backside. They recycle grease from restaurant grease," the investigator said. "It smells...hard to describe...old, rank grease.”
Tate said the company has been trying to mitigate the odors by using misters to dilute it and by burning hickory wood to mask it.
He likes his job because he never knows where it will take him.
“We go from petrochemical plants down to a neighbor painting a fence,” Tate said.
People file complaints; the city then investigates and then can cite violators under state and local pollution regulations.
“We follow state guidelines,” Tate said.
But big chemical plants and oil refineries are now taking issue with the work of Houston’s pollution police. In a case scheduled to be heard later this year before the Texas Supreme Court, a group of big energy companies will argue that the City of Houston is breaking Texas law.
The big companies - which include ExxonMobil and Conoco Phillips - say only the state can legally enforce Texas environmental laws. Lawyers for the industry did not make themselves available for an interview. But in briefs filed with the court, they argue that Houston is going rogue, enforcing state pollution laws because: “Houston disagrees with the TCEQ’s enforcement actions.
