Maria-Elena Giner, appointed by former president Joe Biden, who was recognized for revising aging and the International Borders and Water Commission in the United States, was replaced by a president of the president of Donald Trump, according to three sources with knowledge of the case, said on Monday.
William “Chad” McIntosh, who was the interim assistant administrator of the environmental protection agency under the administrator Lee Zeldin, was appointed to lead the binational agency, said a White House official.
The change of staff arrives at a critical moment for the IBWC because it works to repair and extend the aging factory of South Bay, a long -awaited project which inaugurated last year and will double the capacity of the installation. It also occurs while Zeldin plans to visit the factory on Tuesday and talk about efforts to stop the wastewater crisis for decades.
McIntosh had previously served under the first Trump administration at the head of the EPA international and tribal affairs and was appointed to the interim assistant administrator earlier this year.
Before joining the Federal Agency, McIntosh managed the global and environmental policy of the Ford Motor Company for almost two decades. According to an EPA press release in 2018, McIntosh was also deputy director of Michigan Dept. of Environmental Quality, where he worked closely with tribal and state leaders, supervised regulatory reform and criminal surveys, and led the development of administrative rules for the State.
Mexico and the United States are represented on the IBWC by a commissioner appointed by their respective presidents. They oversee several infrastructure along the international border.
In San Diego, the agency’s American section is responsible for treating some of Tijuana’s wastewater in the South Bay wastewater treatment plant based in San Ysidro before freeing it into the Pacific Ocean.
But years of mismanagement, under-effective and failure of the equipment on both sides of the border, as well as partisan policy, have led to beaches closings due to contaminated ocean water, reported economic losses and increasing concerns concerning long-term health effects of polluted air and water exposure.
Insufficient and broken treatment infrastructures in Mexico have forced the American factory to take more wastewater than designed to manage. This had consequences on the aging and the Malmanded factory of South Bay. Almost all parts of the almost 30 -year -old factory had to be set. The plant has often been obstructed with wastewater, garbage and sediment, allowing several million gallons per day of partially treated wastewater to enter the ocean. Consequently, the agency’s factory has been cited several times to violate the quality standards of water and local air quality.
But since his appointment in August 2021, Giner has worked to revise operations at the South Bay factory to inform him after years of poor organization and under-investment.
She highlighted many of the factory and agency challenges, especially he operated with a skeleton crew and had no capital plan.
Originally published:
California Daily Newspapers
