4.3.   Decentralization to the Counties and Municipalities

In 1970, a municipal reform reduced the number of municipalities to 275 - one fifth of the original number - and the number of counties to 14 - half of the original number. The aim of the reform was to ensure that the individual municipalities had a population base large enough to enable them to build up a professional administration to manage their affairs. Danish Municipalities and Counties have always had the right to impose taxes.

The municipal reform was undertaken by the Ministry of the Interior, the same ministry that around 1970 was responsible for matters of pollution. The Ministry considered pollution problems primarily to be a matter between the enterprises and their neighbours, and therefore considered it natural that the Municipalities should have responsibility for solving such problems.

Danish municipalities apportioned according to population

It was on that background that the Municipal Councils became the foundation for the new environmental administration that entered into force on 1 October 1974.

At the technical-administrative level each Municipality already had a department of technical management which among other things knew how to run sewage treatment plants and sewerage systems, and to process building permit applications.

A role was also given to the Counties in 1974. There were two reasons for this. One was the wish to see tasks requiring more specialist knowledge transferred to a larger unit. Thus, for example, the county authorities were assigned the responsibility for issuing environmental consents to the most complex enterprises. The other reason was that some tasks, not least those concerning watercourses, coastal areas and the groundwater, transgressed municipal borders. In this regard the Counties had the benefit of their experience with running the County Water Inspectorates.

The most marked change in the division of responsibility since 1974 has been the following: From the start it was the Counties who were responsible for issuing consents to particularly complex and environmentally troublesome enterprises, while supervision of these enterprises was placed in the hands of the Municipalities, the latter being considered best suited to solving local problems. In practice, however, the consent conditions were rarely enforced because the Municipal Councils did not feel any responsibility for them.

In a 1986 amendment of the law it was therefore decided that authorization and supervision should in future go hand in hand. Thus the Counties now also supervise the enterprises to whom they have issued environmental consents. The impact of this reform is considered in Denmark to be positive: The same politicians are responsible for the consent conditions as are responsible for ensuring that they are complied with. The same experts - or at least the same expert organization - stipulate and enforce consent conditions. This enhances staff motivation and provides for a more detailed knowledge of the individual enterprise.

As the years have gone by, the Counties have attained a more and more central position in Danish environmental administration. This is partly because they, as was intended, have been able to build up considerable technical expertise, and partly because the county politicians have been good at providing the staff necessary for the Counties to fulfil their responsibilities.

Map of Denmark showing the counties

As an example, new legislation on contaminated sites has imposed a major new responsibility on the Counties (cf. Section 10.4). In addition, there is a clear tendency for the Danish EPA to reassign more and more of its responsibilities to the Counties in step with the increasing pressure of work placed on the Agency by the EC.

In terms of manpower assigned to the environmental front, the Municipal and County Councils are roughly equal in size with approx. 1,000 staff each.

It should be mentioned that as part of the economic interplay between the State, the Counties and the Municipalities, a political agreement was entered into in the mid 1980s whereby each time the State imposes new responsibilities on the Counties or Municipalities it has to reimburse them for the resultant additional expenses. The compensation is disbursed with the State Block Grants to the Counties and Municipalities, the sum being reimbursed by the ministry that imposed the new responsibilities. The purpose of this system is to hold overall public expenditure in check, but it has also curbed issuance of new rules by the government.

4.3.1.   The Counties:

Political level:
Each County normally has a committee for technical and environmental matters whose responsibility is environmental administration within the county. The committee determines the outcome of the most important cases concerning environmental matters, cases only exceptionally being placed on the agenda of the County Council itself. The committee normally meets every 14 days.

Administration:
Each County normally has an environmental department with an average staff of 70. The environmental department is typically part of the technical division together with a nature conservation and regional planning department and a highway department. In some Counties the environmental department is combined with the nature conservation and regional planning department as one unit that takes care of both pollution and nature protection. The staff of a typical environmental department comprises approx. 30 personnel with a higher technical education (many different specialities), approx. 30 technical personnel and approx. 10 other personnel of other types (mainly clerical staff). Some environmental departments also employ a lawyer.

Environmental administration in a country

Main tasks:
A considerable part of county resources on the environmental front are utilized on recipient inspection. This consists of the county authorities collecting samples from watercourses, lakes and coastal areas, and reviewing environmental conditions and trends. Among other things, the Counties provide data for following up on the Action Plan on the Aquatic Environment.

Enterprises are another important item in the environmental work undertaken by the Counties. This task is more or less equally divided between issuance of consents and inspection.

Wastedepositories/groundwater now also comprise a considerable part of the work. The Counties have to register and examine the depositories and the responsibility for planning and undertaking remediation now also rests with them. In addition, they have to monitor the quality of the groundwater and share out the water resources via water abstraction permits. The main threats to the groundwater are agricultural leaching of nitrate, waste depositories, the filling of gravel pits with soil, and pesticides.

The Counties are the environmental authority in relation to municipal sewage treatment plants (approx. 1,500 in all). They have to ensure that the Municipalities comply with the requirements stipulated in the Action Plan on the Aquatic Environment and in the specific sewage discharge consents.

Landfills, which comprise a special group of enterprises, also fall under the environmental authority of the Counties.

County watercourses and ochre are also the responsibility of the Counties. That they have to maintain approx. 7,000 km of county watercourses (the largest of Danish watercourses) means that in addition to administrative personnel, they also employ maintenance personnel.

4.3.2.   The Municipalities:

Political level:
Municipal committee structure is currently undergoing upheaval. Thus one finds many different committees with responsibility for environmental administration, the most common being that it lies with a committee for technical and environmental matters. As is the case in the Counties, the committee has the responsibility for daily administration, with cases only exceptionally being brought before the Municipal Council itself. How much responsibility is delegated to the committee depends on the size of the Municipality and the management style employed. The committee meets once a month, although in some Municipalities every two weeks.

Administration:
The committee for technical and environmental matters is served by a technical director and his department. In an average Danish municipality of 19,000 inhabitants, the environmental department will comprise 3-4 staff, of which one or two will have a higher education (e.g. engineer or biologist). The municipal technical/environmental departments seldom have a lawyer. If serious legal problems arise, they ask the Municipality’s legal advisors.

Each Municipality has a part share in an environmental and foodstuff control unit (EFCU). On average there is one for every nine municipalities, and they cover a population base of approx 170,000 inhabitants. There are a total of 31 such EFCU’s in Denmark. They always include a laboratory for undertaking environmental and foodstuff analyses. Moreover, they always have administrative responsibilities within the foodstuff area. However, while environmental analyses are always undertaken by the EFCU, administrative responsibility can lie with either the municipal technical and environmental department or the EFCU. EFCU’s have on average approx. 40 staff.

An EFCU is primarily a laboratory, and as such is subject to the same analysis quality standards as private laboratories. In Denmark these quality standards are included in an accreditation system adapted to the EC. There is a certain amount of competition between the private and public laboratories, but the Municipalities traditionally use their own laboratories.

Environmental administration in a municiplality

Copenhagen Municipality:
Copenhagen - with its population of approx. 450,000 - is both a county and a primary municipality. Copenhagen thus has to undertake the tasks mentioned under the heading "The Counties", as well as those mentioned below. Copenhagen is also somewhat special from the organizational point of view. Environmental matters in Copenhagen are primarily dealt with by the City of Copenhagen Agency of Environmental Protection, which has a staff of more than 100. In addition, the Sewerage Division attends to matters relating to the discharge of waste water.

Frederiksberg Municipality:
This enclave of 80,000 inhabitants located in Copenhagen is also both a county and a primary municipality. However, as there are few industrial enterprises located there, there are not many environmental tasks to be attended to.

Administrative responsibilities:
The responsibilities of the Municipalities as regards environmental matters fall into two main categories - administrative responsibilities and service functions.

The Municipalities are the environmental authority in relation to the agricultural sector. This gives the Municipalities approx. 75,000 farms to supervise, of which just over half are livestock farms. The task is primarily one of supervision because general regulations are stipulated in the Statutory Order on Livestock, Livestock Manure, Silage, etc., and in the Environmental Protection Act. The Municipalities are the environmental authority in relation to approx. 6,000 industrial enterprises which are listed enterprises. This entails both the issuance of consents and inspection in the field.

The Municipal Councils are the environmental authority in relation to all other enterprises that may give rise to environmental problems such as being a nuisance to neighbours, discharging trade effluent or producing hazardous waste. This group of enterprises is not clearly defined, and their number has not been reckoned.

The Municipalities also administer all other regulations that are not specifically the responsibility of the County Councils, e.g. regulations concerning household oil storage tanks, household pets and livestock, etc.

Service functions:
The Municipalities run the sewerage system and the sewage treatment plants themselves. Current total annual construction expenses amount to approx. DKK 2,000 million, and running expenses to approx. DKK 2,000 million, i.e. a total of over DKK 4,000 million. The Municipalities issue all consents for trade effluent discharge to the sewerage system (also in the case of discharges from (a)-listed enterprises (see Annex 1) under the environmental authority of the County - see section 5.5), they being the ones who have the responsibility for ensuring that the treatment plants comply with the consent criteria. Training of the personnel operating the treatment plants is obligatory.

The Municipalities also run the municipal water works themselves. Of these there are approx. 350, and they together produce approx. 60% of the water supply. The remaining 40% is derived from small private water works.

In addition, the Municipalities are responsible for waste and recycling. Most of the tasks are usually taken care of by contracting out to private contractors. Furthermore, it is usual practice that the Municipalities run joint ventures to deal with the main tasks in the waste area, e.g. landfills and incineration plants.

The Municipalities are the watercourse authority for municipal watercourses (approx. 13,000 km). First and foremost, this means that the Municipalities are responsible for maintaining these watercourses.

The total number of municipal employees engaged in these service functions is approx. 5,000, of which 2,000 are employed in the sewage sector.

4.3.3.   Evaluation and trends:

The most discussed disadvantage of decentralization is non-uniform administration. This can consist of non-uniform rulings and non-uniform enforcement.

Non-uniform rulings undoubtedly occur in the Danish system. If the non-uniformity is justifiable, it can be in full accordance with the law; for example, criteria can be individualized depending on the character of the surrounding environment. However, everything indicates that it is uniformity that is the most common: The environmental staff in the Municipalities help and support each other, they are trained to work with Guidelines, and the declining number of appeals indicates that the Guidelines are adhered to.

Non-uniform enforcement is probably of greater practical significance. The premise on which Danish environmental administration is based is that if breaches of the law are ascertained by the authorities, the situation in question shall be rectified. However, the statistics on supervisory activity indicate that some Municipalities very rarely inspect the enterprises under their authority (see Chapter 13). It occasionally happens that neighbours or competitors complain to the Danish EPA about municipal authorities turning a blind eye to breaches of the law and letting them continue. Some of these cases prove to be well-founded.

A certain albeit rather marginal degree of non-uniformity is therefore part of the price of decentralization.

From the organizational point of view, the fragmentation of the environmental administration is perhaps a greater problem. County environmental departments are large - the 14 counties have a total staff of approx. 1,000. However, at the municipal level, the 275 Municipalities also have a total staff of approx. 1,000, and only the larger Municipalities - as well as those that allow their EFCU’s to undertake administrative tasks - have environmental departments large enough to permit professional specialization. The environmental staff in the average small Danish municipality have therefore to be very versatile.

The advantage of decentralization is that the local politicians, both at the county and the municipal levels, become engaged in the task. It is true that the politicians have to attract new jobs to their municipality, as well as to ensure a sound commercial climate. Nevertheless, the fact that they are concomitantly responsible for the environment has meant firstly, that over the years they have assigned considerable personnel resources to environmental matters, and secondly, that most politicians have been willing to put their foot down - if necessary by submitting a report to the police - if an enterprise has erred.

The consequence of the Danish system is thus that there are personnel sufficient to inspect many enterprises, and that enforcement is good in the case of those enterprises that are inspected.

In the long term - more than approx. 10 years in the future - the municipal structure of Denmark may very well change. However, municipal structure will not be determined by environmental responsibilities, other responsibilities being considerably more burdensome on the public purse. The present municipalities are dimensioned so as to have a conveniently sized school system, while the counties are dimensioned so as to have a conveniently sized hospital service.