EPA chief on mine spill response: ‘We should have done it better’

The head of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) says officials should have warned communities in Colorado sooner about a toxic mine spill amid criticism from Republicans and the Navajo Nation.

“I would argue that we should have done it better,” EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy told a House hearing on Thursday. “Are we trying to do better? Yes.”

Navajo leaders have heavily criticized the federal government for its handling of the Aug. 5 spill of 3 million gallons of toxic waste into Colorado’s Animas river, threatening to sue the EPA over the incident and questioning the safety of the water.

{mosads}Republicans took up that cause during the hearing. Led by Oversight Chairman Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), they slammed McCarthy for what they considered lax coordination with the Navajo Nation and other Indian tribes affected by the spill.

Chaffetz said the EPA should have contacted Navajo officials earlier and given them access to the spill site when they requested it. He also questioned McCarthy’s testimony that the EPA has been working with the tribes on the issues.

“You didn’t make the call. You have the president of the Navajo Nation, and you personally didn’t get involved in this. It’s one of the worst spills we’ve ever had,” Chaffetz told McCarthy.

“You’re totally misleading, totally out of touch and totally inappropriate in this instance.”  

McCarthy said the agency did what it could to get information to the tribes before the spill affected them. Officials notified the Navajo Nation about the spill on Aug. 6, two days before the waste reached them.

“I regret that,” she said. “I wish it had been earlier, but the plume didn’t get to the Navajo until Aug. 8, so we had time to work with them on it, to coordinate with them ever since.”

McCarthy also said the agency was looking to speed up its process in the future.

“We issued a notification to all of our regions to go back and look at what our notification process is, how do we improve it, how do we test it frequently and I think we could have done a lot better than this,” she said.

Russell Begaye, the Navajo Nation’s president, told the committee on Thursday that the Navajo are concerned about the mishandling of the spill, the coordination between the EPA and the tribes affected by it and “the resulting culture of distrust.”

“Hold the EPA accountable for the toxic spill that occurred on Aug. 5,” Begaye told the committee. “Don’t let them get away with their negligence.”

In an interview with The Hill on Wednesday, Begaye said he was disappointed by the government’s interaction with the Nation.

“With Obama, we’ve been asking for him to at least give us a call and tell us you are there to help us and walk with us. But we have heard not a word. It seems like they’ve just closed the doors and walked away,” Begaye said. “We were the swing vote for them for years and they haven’t done a thing.”