Into the Light:
The Enforcement Review Committee

By Darcie H. Greggs, P.Geol., Chair
Enforcement Review Committee

This is the inaugural column of a series on the Enforcement Review Committee (ERC). Over the last few months, it has become apparent that the ERC is viewed as being somewhat shrouded in mystery – few people know what we do and fewer know why or how. Although the committee operates within certain confidentiality constraints, the mysterious aspect has been completely inadvertent. The purpose of this column, then, is to shed some light on the structure and function of the ERC and to outline cases which may be of interest to the membership, or possibly to colleagues who should be filling out membership application forms.

Who: The ERC falls under APEGGA’s Registration and Compliance Department. It is comprised of the Director (Dave Todd, P.Eng.), the Compliance Co-ordinator (Jo-Ann Marshall), the Compliance Secretary (Louise Heron) and ten volunteer professional members. We employ legal counsel and occasionally retain the services of a private investigator. When cases get really interesting, the Compliance Department also works with the RCMP and detectives from both Calgary and Edmonton Police Services.

What: Under the EGGP Act, the ERC is responsible for investigating cases where the individual or corporation practicing engineering, geology or geophysics is not registered or licensed (i.e. practice violations) and where the unregistered (and sometimes unqualified) individual or corporation uses a name or title which is reserved exclusively for members (title violation).

How: The first step in the ERC process is the identification of an unregistered person or corporation. How does this come about? The Compliance staff conduct ongoing reviews of various media and technical publications. In addition, complaints or inquiries can be phoned, faxed or e-mailed to Compliance Coordinator Jo-Ann Marshall, (jmarshall@apegga.org). The only requirements of complainants are that they identify themselves, and provide supporting evidence of the alleged violation in the form of a business card, report, etc. In the case of media clippings, the name of the publication and date also are required.

Next time: the rest of "How", "Why", and outstanding arrest warrants.P