Page 8 - Louisiana 811 Magazine 2020 Issue 3

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law, the two parties, consisting of the excavator and the utility, can agree to extend the mark-by time themselves, but if they can’t come to some kind of agreement and the pipeline operator says, ‘Look, I can’t get this thing marked. If they come out here to dredge, they’re gonna hit my pipeline’, then obviously that’s a safety issue
that needs addressed. So, then the pipeline operator
can come to us and say, ‘Hey, I want you to extend my mark-by time.’ We can then order the excavator to
wait a week or whatever we decide. On the flip side,
the dredging contractor may be out there working for months and forget to update their ticket. He’s on day 19 of his ticket and says ‘Gosh I missed my window, now I’ve got to shut down.’ That’s a very expensive thing to do. So, the Commissioner can grant an extension to that expiration date provided the pipeline is still marked
and the pipeline operator has no objections.” Steven interprets the application of this law in a way that is
easy to understand. “So, if we can determine that it’s safe to continue working, the Commissioner can extend the expiration date. In doing so, the contractor has the peace of mind that they can continue to work safely and also know they’re not in violation of the law.” Steven said, “This can be extremely beneficial to both parties. There’s something for the operator, who maybe can’t mark
in time. And there’s something for the excavator who perhaps forgot to update their ticket.”
In this past legislative session, Senate Concurrent Resolution 69 formed the One Call Agricultural Study Group. Although Steven is not a voting member of the group, his role is to assist the group which is made up of stakeholders, utility operators, farmers and landowners. He said, “What the resolution is asking us to do is to
look at whether or not the state should grant some exemptions to the agricultural community from the One Call requirements. A number of states have exemptions for agriculture and they’re asking us to look and see if such exemptions would be appropriate in Louisiana.” The final proposed change is yet to be determined. Steven continued, “Additionally, House Bill 382 was filed. This Bill would make positive response and white lining a requirement.” but it hasn’t been heard yet due to COVID - 19.
Another of Steven’s roles is to review the yearly enforcement data, the annual reports the Pipeline
Safety Program receives from their pipeline distribution operators saying how many tickets they received and how many damages they had. “The data looks pretty good. We have a few operators that had some issues in 2019 and we’re addressing those. Overall, what we learned from the data was encouraging,” explained Steven. “The damages are broken down by root cause. When we review the data, we look to see if the damage occurred as the result of no ticket or perhaps it was not located properly or not properly exposed?”
He observed, “One of the things we discovered was that operators who saw a significant increase in tickets saw a decrease in damages and then an operator who saw
a significant decrease in tickets, many times saw an increase in damages.”
6 • Louisiana 811
2020, Issue 3