The board may act on uncontested applications, issue a written order granting, conditioning, or denying them, and must schedule and decide preliminary hearings for contested case hearing requests. An applicant can request a contested case hearing within 20 days after certain grant orders.
Sec. 36.4051. BOARD ACTION; CONTESTED CASE HEARING REQUESTS; PRELIMINARY HEARING. (a) The board may take action on any uncontested application at a properly noticed public meeting held at any time after the public hearing at which the application is scheduled to be heard. The board may issue a written order to: (1) grant the application; (2) grant the application with special conditions; or (3) deny the application. (b) The board shall schedule a preliminary hearing to hear a request for a contested case hearing filed in accordance with rules adopted under Section 36.415. The preliminary hearing may be conducted by: (1) a quorum of the board; (2) an individual to whom the board has delegated in writing the responsibility to preside as a hearing examiner over the hearing or matters related to the hearing; or (3) the State Office of Administrative Hearings under Section 36.416. (c) Following a preliminary hearing, the board shall determine whether any person requesting the contested case hearing has standing to make that request and whether a justiciable issue related to the application has been raised. If the board determines that no person who requested a contested case hearing had standing or that no justiciable issues were raised, the board may take any action authorized under Subsection (a). (d) An applicant may, not later than the 20th day after the date the board issues an order granting the application, demand a contested case hearing if the order: (1) includes special conditions that were not part of the application as finally submitted; or (2) grants a maximum amount of groundwater production that is less than the amount requested in the application. Added by Acts 2015, 84th Leg., R.S., Ch. 405 (H.B. 2179), Sec. 4, eff. June 10, 2015.