Revised Written Notice of Proposed Action Template for Structural Civil Penalty Actions

Enclosed is the “Written Notice of Proposed Action Template for Structural Civil Penalty Actions”. The purpose of the template is to facilitate and encourage statewide consistency when County Agricultural Commissioners issue a Notice of Proposed Action (NOPA) in conjunction with activities authorized by Business and Professions Code section 8617 (structural civil penalties).

This guidance replaces previous examples provided in Hearing Officer Training and the NOPA template in letter ENF 08-20. This template aligns the Structural NOPA with the revised Agricultural NOPA template issued in ENF 2017-14.

The enclosed template primarily differs from the previous example by summarizing the violations in the opening paragraph and separating the description of the factual circumstances from the violation descriptions. The annotated template version includes guidance (in italics) on the information to include in a NOPA and example wording.

As a reminder, NOPAs and closing documents for all administrative civil penalties are now submitted to the Department of Pesticide Regulation by uploading these documents to CalPEATS. However, CACs still need to send a copy of the NOPA and appropriate closing documents for structural civil penalty cases to the Structural Pest Control Board (SPCB).

If you have questions about using the new template for drafting NOPAs, or about adapting the template (for example, proposing a three working days suspension of a registered company or licensee, or attending a board-approved course of instruction in lieu of a fine pursuant to Title 16 California Code of Regulations section 1922.3), please contact the Enforcement Branch Liaison assigned to your county.

Please make this information available to your staff as a reference in preparing and processing cases. If you have any questions, please contact the Enforcement Branch Liaison assigned to your county.

Sincerely,