In 聽an interview with a local Puerto Rican media outlet, the president of the Environmental Quality Board (EQB) made a shocking admission about the landfill crisis in the U.S. territory. Weldin Ortiz Franco acknowledged that they have eight to 10 inspectors, who are not exclusively dedicated to landfill inspections and sometimes fail to inspect all the landfills on the island.
鈥淲e try to see them [in] quarterly fiscal years but there are many that we cannot do it,鈥� he told聽The Spokesmanin Spanish. To have more employees, he said, 鈥渨e could have more comprehensive work plans and a system of more frequent inspections.鈥�
The EQB in Puerto Rico has local authority over the 27 active landfills on the island. They received that power in 1994 when they submitted a proposal detailing how they would follow federal rules and regulations when in charge of the landfills.
However, a citizen鈥檚 action group called聽Puerto Rico Limpio (or Clean Puerto Rico), alleges that the local EQB has illegally changed some its original rules for landfills and didn鈥檛 get approval from the Environmental Protection Agency to do so.
The group also claims that 19 of the 27 landfills in Puerto Rico are non-compliant, and for years, the EPA has ignored these problems, despite several internal reports suggesting they should act.
The relationship of the EPA and EQB is a unique and tricky one. Once the EPA has granted local authority to the EQB, they are technically no longer in charge of the landfills.
鈥淓QB has primary responsibility for regulating solid waste landfills in the Commonwealth, and federal landfill criteria governing solid waste are not directly enforceable by EPA in Puerto Rico. Only EQB has permitting and solid waste enforcement authority over the landfills,鈥� said John Martin, a spokesman for the EPA, in a statement to InsideSources.
However, the statement Martin provided was the same exact language the EPA used in itsSeptember 2016 Fact Sheet, titled 鈥淓PA鈥檚 Work To Address Puerto Rico鈥檚 Landfills.鈥�
But the EPA will step in and enforce federal laws if there are serious environmental and health risks under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) Section 7003 Imminent and Substantial Endangerment Authority. They used that to send consent orders to nine open dumps 鈥� multi-family dumpsite of any size or content, which is illegal under RCRA 鈥� in Puerto Rico, according to aJune letter聽from the EPA Region 2 Administrator Judith Enck on behalf of EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy to Rep. Dennis Ross, R-Fla.
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