According to Delegate Madrangchar, the oversight hearing with EQPB was a result of concerns by the Governors’ Association regarding the sometimes arduous and costly requirements by EQPB regulations, which contribute delays of public infrastructure development projects by the various state governments.
As a result of the hearing several proposed solutions were agreed upon that should help to alleviate problems. It was discussed by EQPB that the Ministry of Public Infrastructure, Industries and Commerce should hire a fulltime Environmental Engineer at the CIP Office, whose sole responsibility is to prepare Environmental Assessment (EA) reports on all National and States’ CIP projects. Doing this will not only help speed up the EQPB permitting process, but will also spare the State Governments from the expenses of hiring private environmental consultants to do their EA reports. Delegate Madrangchar made the comment that this has been done before and in fact he himself was once such a person at the National Government, tasked with such responsibilities.Another concern brought up during the hearing is that EQPB fines to the states for violations of environmental regulations are very taxing on the limited financial resources of the State Governments. Delegate Madrangchar says that the JGA Committee reached a consensus with EQPB that they should try to avoid having the state governments pay monetary fines for their environmental violations, rather EQPB should have the states do in-kind mitigation programs to offset the fines assessed to them for violations. Delegate Madrangchar was optimistic with the results of the hearing and commented that sometimes we don’t need legislation to change for the better. “The hearing was enlightening to members of the JGA Committee and the proposals put forth to address existing problems are workable and satisfactory.”
