Legislative Audit Committee. The bill increases the fee that the state engineer collects with regard to dam project design review. The fee collected for the examination and filing of each set of plans and specifications required to be filed with the state engineer for a proposed dam project is increased from $3 for each $1,000 of the estimated cost of the proposed project to $6 for each $1,000 of the estimated cost of the proposed project, with the maximum fee raised from $3,000 to $30,000.
The bill adds a fee of $2,000 per year for the annual inspection required of a dam against which the state engineer has imposed storage restrictions. The state engineer cannot impose the fee in the first year that the dam has been put under storage restrictions. The state engineer may waive the fee in any year that the state engineer determines that the owner or operator has taken reasonable steps toward curing deficiencies.