Auditor slams watchdog’s lack of oversight

A provincial watchdog agency that oversees projects such as dams, mines and power plants is not doing enough to monitor and regulate projects it has approved, says a report by British Columbia Auditor-General John Doyle.

And along with shortfalls that include a lack of routine site inspections and vague wording of commitments that companies are supposed to keep, B.C.’s Environmental Assessment Office is falling down on its obligation to share information with the public, Mr. Doyle concluded.

“The audit found that the Environmental Assessment Office cannot assure British Columbians that mitigation efforts are having the intended effects because adequate monitoring is not occurring and follow-up evaluations are not being conducted,” Mr. Doyle said in his report, released Thursday. “We also found that information currently being provided to the public is not sufficient to ensure accountability.”

The EAO was created in 1995 with the mandate of ensuring that major projects meet environmental, economic and social sustainability goals.

Of 219 projects that have undergone or are currently undergoing an environmental assessment, 53 per cent have been approved and only one has been refused certification.

Mr. Doyle did not assess the process leading up to certification, but focused on follow-up and compliance, where he found shortcomings that include a lack of routine site inspections. Between 2000 and 2004, the EAO ran a pilot program to verify compliance at three projects.

The projects were found to be mostly in compliance, but issues of noncompliance were “identified and rectified when possible,” the report says.

Despite those positive results, the pilot program did not lead to a full-time system and “formal site inspections are not carried out regularly by the EAO.”

The report included six recommendations, including that the Environmental Assessment Office “ensure commitments are clearly written in a measurable and enforceable manner.”

B.C. Environment Minister Terry Lake on Thursday said the office has already started to make changes in how it tracks projects and that the government will implement all of Mr. Doyle’s recommendations by late 2011.

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Source: Globe & Mail