Watchdog faults EPA for state compliance plan backlog

摘要

Despite substantial improvement in recent years, EPA is still routinely missing its own one-year deadline foracting on states' air quality plan submissions, according to a new report by the agency's inspector general thatgrew out of a 2019 clash between the Trump administration and California.As of this January, the agency was behind schedule for almost 40% of about 900 submissions awaiting action,IG Sean O'Donnell's office found in the audit released this morning. Among the reasons for the lag: Thecomplexity of some submissions, limited resources, and legal and policy issues "that would set nationalprecedents."