Skip to content

Breaking News

State audit: Hartford regional trash agency failing to file mandated reports on operations

Author

The quasi-public agency responsible for the Hartford regional trash-to-energy system has repeatedly failed to provide the state with required operational, financial, personnel and planning reports, according to a new state audit.

State auditor’s report released Wednesday said the Materials Innovation and Recycling Authority (MIRA) failed to file various legally required reports over two years to the legislature, the governor’s office and a state oversight agency. Some reports were filed too late to be of much use, while others were never submitted.

The result, the auditors warned, was that, “Legislative oversight of the authority was diminished.” In addition, the audit report for the fiscal years 2015 and 2016 found that MIRA failed to supply mandated annual plans of operations to the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection for review.

MIRA officials rejected the auditor’s findings that it failed to live up to its statutory reporting requirements.

The quasi-state agency has been under fire in recent years for its management of the aging and often-broken Hartford trash plant and for failing to reach an agreement with a private operator to take over the system. MIRA was originally created to replace the scandal-plagued Connecticut Resources Recovery Authority.

The auditors’ report stated that MIRA failed to supply the governor’s office quarterly reports on its finances, personnel and operations when those reports should have been submitted.

But officials of the quasi-state agency responded that they only submitted those quarterly reports “after the prior year’s annual reports are filed.” In 2014, that meant the quarterly reports weren’t filed until 2015.

“Also, as far as we know, there are no set deadlines for these [quarterly] reports per the Statutes,” MIRA officials said.

MIRA was also cited for failing to supply the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection with mandated annual plans of operations. The auditors warned that the lack of those plans meant state officials couldn’t be sure that MIRA was conforming to the statewide solid waste management program.

But MIRA officials said DEEP revised the statewide garbage management plan in 2016 and that plan included proposals for redevelopment and private management of the quasi-state agency’s Hartford regional system.

According to MIRA, that revised statewide plan “essentially and effectively has served as MIRA’s annual plan of operations” since July 2016. Thus, MIRA officials said, they had no need to submit anything else to the state.

None of MIRA’s explanations satisfied the state’s auditors, according to the report.

Gregory B. Hladky can be reached at ghladky@courant.com