BUDGET/EPA/SCOTT PRUITT/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “President Donald Trump’s administration is moving ahead with a plan to accelerate the rehabilitation of Superfund sites, polluted locations designated by the government for long-term cleanup projects.
Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt on Tuesday [7-25-17] signed off on recommendations from a task force that will accelerate cleanup efforts to reduce the more than 1,300 Superfund sites on the agency’s priorities list amid dwindling budgets.
Mr. Trump has proposed cutting another $330 million from the program annually, but Mr. Pruitt doesn’t see that as an impediment to cleaning up the contaminated areas and making them ready for business investment.
‘This is something that is core to this agency,’ Mr. Pruitt said Tuesday. ‘The statute puts it upon this agency to get accountability from those companies [responsible for the pollutants at the sites]. Our job is to get sites remediated. Let’s set some goals, let’s set some objectives and get some of these sites off the list.’
Among the strategies the EPA plans to implement: targeting specific sites that are “not showing sufficient progress,” clarifying and streamlining agency policies and guidance to expedite remediation and encouraging private investment in the cleanup process and reuse of contaminated facilities.”
-Eli Stokols, “EPA Moves to Expedite Superfund Cleanup Projects,” The Wall Street Journal online, July 25, 2017 01:44pm