By The Star Staff
Carolina District Sen. Marissa “Marissita” Jiménez Santoni and Rep. Wanda del Valle Correa demanded Monday that Carolina Mayor José Aponte Dalmau join them in seeking an immediate solution “to the serious problem of flooding that the residents of the Cacao neighborhood of the municipality have experienced for years.”
“This headache is nothing new in the area, but it began to get worse from 2021 to now,” Jiménez Santoni said. “At that time, we made countless efforts with the Department of Natural and Environmental Resources and even with the National Guard, but we needed the mayor’s endorsement to tackle the situation, starting with a cleanup in which improvements [funded] by FEMA were to be carried out. However, he [Aponte Dalmau] was totally opposed to meeting with us and making any kind of official arrangements. … And today we see what is happening again -- water everywhere.”
“More than a year ago, Sen. Marissita Jiménez and yours truly asked the mayor for help with this critical case,” del Valle said. “… In fact, the National Guard was willing to fix the situation, but the municipality never responded.”
“Today again, together with Sen. Marissita Jiménez, we make a public call to the mayor to correct, once and for all, this unfortunate situation,” she added. “It was the municipality itself that covered one of the pipes and led to all this.”
Del Valle also pointed out that “19 months after written communications with the municipality, absolutely nothing has happened.”
“The problem has slept the sleep of the righteous!” she said. “The saddest thing is that, according to the National Weather Service, it will continue to rain heavily in the eastern region of Puerto Rico.”