The state Department of Environment and Natural Resources squandered nearly $700,000 this year buying environmental restoration from a company that had already been paid for the same work by another state agency nine years earlier, said a state legislative review released today.
The state legislature's Program Evaluation Division also found that the state's losses could continue. The environmental agency has certified that the company can sell more acreage for environmental restoration that also had previously been bought by the state Department of Transportation.
"Decisions related to this controversy resulted in actual and potential future losses to the environmental integrity of the Neuse River basin," said the report.