Who it covers
Any “food service establishment” in the regional wastewater service area — a facility “storing, preparing, serving, manufacturing, packing or otherwise handling food” that has any process producing grease or that needs an exhaust hood. Restaurants, obviously; also school kitchens, hospital kitchens, commissaries, bakeries, markets with a deli.
The maintenance rule
Interceptors “shall be fully pumped out and cleaned once every three months or when the combined FOG and solids accumulation in the grease interceptor equals 25 percent of the design hydraulic depth of the grease interceptor, whichever occurs first.” Two rules, one trigger: the first one you hit. The frequency can be tuned to your real grease load, but never stretched past three months without written authorization from the Director of Municipal Utilities. If an inspection finds you over 25%, the Director can require a pump-out “in no case more than 24 hours following issuance of an order to clean.”
The paperwork rule
After every pump-out you must obtain and keep the hauler’s documentation, and the chapter lists what it has to contain. The six required lines → Then keep it — with your cleaning log, kitchen BMP and training log, 25%-rule readings, any sampling and any spill records — on the premises for no less than three years, available to the Director, any inspector “and the public” on request. The three-year file →
The prohibitions
- Additives “for the purpose of emulsifying or biologically/chemically treating FOG” — enzymes, bacteria, digesters. Why →
- Food grinders in the plumbing system
- Dishwasher discharge to any interceptor or grease control device
- Wastewater over 140°F into any interceptor or trap
- Operating an interceptor over 25% full
- Dumping trap or interceptor waste, or waste cooking oil, to the sewer or storm drain
- Diluting a discharge to pass
When you must install one
At construction, remodel or change of operations; after a change of ownership; or within 180 days of a written notice that your lateral is on the city’s “hot spot” list or that you contributed to a blockage. “Remodel” has a specific definition. Triggers and the waiver →
Enforcement
Violations are misdemeanors; “each day in which any such violation shall continue shall be deemed a separate offense” (Sec. 13.40.250). The Director issues notices, administrative citations and civil penalties under Title 1; the city may suspend or terminate sewer service for a grease-caused blockage or for interceptor maintenance violations (Sec. 13.40.230); and if the city cleans your interceptor for you, the cost is a debt owed jointly by the FSE and the property owner. Dollar amounts →
Where the rule comes from
California’s State Water Board requires every sewer agency, under Order WQ 2022-0103-DWQ, to run a sewer-pipe blockage control program with grease-device requirements, maintenance rules, record-keeping and enforcement authority. That order binds the city, not you. Chapter 13.40 is how Stockton meets it — which is why the inspections are not going away.
Compliant and documented, without thinking about it
Scheduled full pump-outs with the ordinance’s paperwork built into every receipt.
Call (209) 292-2953