Oregon’s Lagging Asbestos Rules; Failed Hack Attempts on New Orleans Websites
photo.ua / Shutterstock.com
Also: Exurban Minnesota subdivisions lament their lack of broadband and a ‘novel concept’ for waiting in line in Massachusetts.
Here’s some of what we’ve been reading this weekend …
PORTLAND, Oregon: Does the Beaver State have an asbestos removal regulatory problem? An investigation by The Oregonian suggests something is amiss regarding whether the state is adhering to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency rules. Those federal regulations dictate that when a large building is being torn down, contractors must give written notification to the overseeing regulatory agency, in this case the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality, at least 10 days in advance, and detail how they checked for asbestos. But The Oregonian found that the state rulemaking hasn’t required such pre-demolition reports from contractors since at least 2001:
Asked by email in July why its rules appeared to diverge from EPA standards, department of environmental quality officials wrote that federal asbestos rules don't apply when a building contains less than certain threshold amounts of asbestos-containing materials.
That assertion is at odds with the language of federal regulation, which explicitly says that "written notice of intention to demolish" is required even when the amount of asbestos is less than the threshold cited by the state. EPA officials said the notification requirement extends to demolitions involving zero asbestos.
It's unclear how the EPA missed the apparent disconnect between federal rules and Oregon's.
An EPA spokesman told the newspaper it’s too early to figure out what steps federal regulators might take regarding the situation in Oregon. [The Oregonian / OregonLive.com]
NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana: The websites of the Office of Inspector General, Independent Police Monitor and the Ethics Review Board in the city of New Orleans “have frequently been down or semi-functional for the past few weeks.” The Lens reports that there’s a reason for that: Those websites were the target of failed hacking attempts and the Ethics Review Board, which oversees the Office of Inspector General and Independent Police Monitor, took down the websites to limit the attacks. [The Lens]
AFTON, Minnesota: The far eastern exurbs of the Twin Cities may have well-off subdivisions with properties that come with a pricetag northward of $1 million, but their Internet access is lousy. “Exurban enclaves are finding that money can’t buy you broadband,” the Star Tribune reports, adding:
In broadband as in other domains, including cellphone coverage, places such as Afton that have fought to remain rural, beating back developers who’ve sought to bring in subdivisions with hundreds of homes, are now too sparsely settled for businesses to make a profit.
One vice president for a national communications firm in a different rural exurb laments: “I’m a cable guy who doesn’t have cable,” he tells the newspaper. “I’m dyin’ out here!” [Star Tribune]
WASHINGTON, District of Columbia: Has DC Health Link, the District of Columbia’s health exchange established under the Affordable Care Act, given some professionals the benefits they need to pursue self-employment? Washington City Paper features the story of Alka Pateriya, who had been stuck in “job lock,” where she was hesitant to leave her job with benefits because she couldn’t afford expensive private health insurance as a freelancer. But with benefits through DC Health Link, she was able to start her own business. “Detractors don’t want Obamacare infringing on their freedom, but the law gave Pateriya hers,” City Paper writes. But there is “no empirical estimates yet of how the Affordable Care Act in particular has affected job lock, in D.C. or nationwide.” [Washington City Paper]
BOSTON, Massachusetts: The latest state trying to improve the process of getting a driver’s license, car registration and related vehicle matters is Massachusetts. The Registry of Motor Vehicles has been trying out “a novel concept” to improve the queue, The Boston Globe reports:
People who are all set with their paperwork file into one express line, while everyone else gets into another.
Why didn’t anyone think of this sooner?
That’s an excellent question. [The Boston Globe]
(Photo by photo.ua / Shutterstock.com)
Michael Grass is Executive Editor of Government Executive’s Route Fifty.
NEXT STORY: Can the Internet of Things Combat Child Obesity in Cities?