Pennsylvania Statutes Title 71 P.S. State Government § 1404. To enforce quarantine regulations; abate nuisances; enforce liens; water from coal mines or tanneries excepted

The commissioner  1 shall have power and authority to order nuisances, detrimental to the public health, or the causes of disease and mortality, to be abated and removed, and to enforce quarantine regulations.

If the owner or occupant of any premises, whereon any nuisance detrimental to the public health exists, fails to comply with any order of the commissioner of health for the abatement or removal thereof, the commissioner, his agents or employés, may enter upon the premises to which such order relates and abate or remove such nuisance.

The expense of such abatement or removal shall be paid by the owner or occupant of such premises, or by the person who caused or maintained such nuisance, and such expense shall be a lien upon the lands upon which the nuisance was maintained; for which a claim may be filed by the commissioner, in the name of the commonwealth, in the court of common pleas for the county in which the lands are, within six months from the date of completion of the work of abatement or removal, subject to the same proceedings for entry or revival of judgment and execution as are provided by law for other municipal liens. The commissioner may also maintain an action against such owner or occupant, in the name of the commonwealth, to recover the amount of such expense, in the same way as debts of like amount are by law recoverable; and the same, when recovered either by enforcement of the lien or by the personal action, shall be paid to the state treasurer, to be held and used as the funds of the department of health; but a final recovery of the amount, in one proceeding, shall be a bar to the further continuance of the other: Provided, however, That this act shall not apply to waters pumped or flowing from coal mines or tanneries.