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Experts warn Puerto Rico at risk amid lack of disaster plan
Source: Associated Press
Experts warn Puerto Rico at risk amid lack of disaster plan
By DANICA COTO
today
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — More than a year after Hurricane Maria caught Puerto Rico’s government wildly unprepared, officials acknowledge they still haven’t come up with a plan to cope with the next such disaster — and it’s not clear when they will.
The U.S. territory’s government insisted for months that it had a complete, updated disaster plan, saying it was kept secret due to protect information about vulnerable infrastructure and officials’ private contact details.
But a suit filed by Puerto Rico’s Center for Investigative Journalism led officials to concede last month that that plan doesn’t deal with catastrophic events such as hurricanes and earthquakes, prompting outrage on an island where many blame government bungling for the estimated 2,975 deaths linked to Category 4 Hurricane Maria, which hit in September 2017.
“The government has clearly failed the people and hid the fact that the plan was under revision,” said Nazario Lugo, a former executive director of Puerto Rico’s emergency management agency and president of the island’s Association of Emergency Managers.
-snip-
By DANICA COTO
today
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — More than a year after Hurricane Maria caught Puerto Rico’s government wildly unprepared, officials acknowledge they still haven’t come up with a plan to cope with the next such disaster — and it’s not clear when they will.
The U.S. territory’s government insisted for months that it had a complete, updated disaster plan, saying it was kept secret due to protect information about vulnerable infrastructure and officials’ private contact details.
But a suit filed by Puerto Rico’s Center for Investigative Journalism led officials to concede last month that that plan doesn’t deal with catastrophic events such as hurricanes and earthquakes, prompting outrage on an island where many blame government bungling for the estimated 2,975 deaths linked to Category 4 Hurricane Maria, which hit in September 2017.
“The government has clearly failed the people and hid the fact that the plan was under revision,” said Nazario Lugo, a former executive director of Puerto Rico’s emergency management agency and president of the island’s Association of Emergency Managers.
-snip-
Read more: https://apnews.com/b1f7501185674871afb9ff12e71f0667