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Weimar Mayor Carlton Tucker attributed a $48,668 fine from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) concerning violations at Weimar’s wastewater treatment plant to a third-party contractor during City Council, Thursday, March 12.
Weimar Public Works has since taken control of all water and wastewater responsibilities. Based on data collected on June 30, 2025, TCEQ filed the alleged violations of high levels of dissolved oxygen and pH in the sewer ponds. Weimar City Manager David Mason said no citizens or the environment faced any harm at any point.
“The levels in the Sewer Pond [No. 1] were higher, and it happens seasonally too. When it gets really hot, the water gets kind of stagnant,” Mason said. “…Those levels were just higher, and the person who was supposed to be doing our water reports didn’t notify them in a timely manner.”
Public Works Director Michael Beyette said the city has implemented a Compliance Supplemental Environmental Project (CSEP) to negotiate resolution with TCEQ. According to TCEQ, a Compliance SEP calls for the local government to correct the alleged violations or restore any environmental harm caused by the alleged violations.
“What I’ve suggested doing and what I included in this SCP is to replace the flow meters and totalizers at the wastewater treatment plant,” Beyette said. “…I’m currently working with engineers to get basically stationary sensors for each of our wastewater lagoons where those would be constantly reading… We can put alarms and things like that onto those to help us better catch when things start changing in the wastewater plant.”
Beyette said the sensors would place Weimar “in a position where we wouldn’t go through this again.” Mason said the city also added more aerators to add more turnover and oxygen to the water. He said the city also reduced the number of porta-potty vendors dumping into the city’s sewer ponds to help relieve the high levels.
“We had a big contract with a big one, and we terminated that contract, so they are no longer dumping porta-potty waste into there, which also creates elevated levels,” Mason said. “A combination of reducing that and bringing more aerators online resolved the issue.”
Weimar’s CSEP will also permit the city to write the costs spent enacting the CSEP off the $48.6k total. According to Beyette, the city has since spent around $25,000 towards resolving the violations that can be written off the total amount. Beyette requested for the city to allocate an additional $20,000 for flexibility regarding quotes from contractors, but Tucker disagreed, and no action was taken. The current costs fall within the city’s approved budget, so more money will not have to be raised or reallocated.
“We do have $50,000 in the budget already for sewer improvements, so at this point, I don’t believe we need to do any budget amendments at this time. We are covered for now,” Tucker said. “If Michael [Beyette] desires to do some improvements later on, we might have to come back and ask for something that comes up later on.”
Tucker said a third-party contractor overseeing the wastewater treatment plant was “not doing his job.” The city fired the contractor in July and hired a new one shortly after. Tucker said there is a possibility for the city to pursue legal reparations.
“Weimar, evidently, was not the only one that was caught up in that sort of situation, so it’s not just Weimar looking at pursuing that particular entity,” Tucker said.
Tucker declined to name the contractor fired for the TCEQ violations and said an attorney from another city is looking into the matter.
