Santiago Set to Have its First Regional Environmental Coordinator

Fernández Mirabal introduces Domingo Rodríguez as the new director of the ministry in Santiago and regional coordinator in Espaillat and other provinces of the Northeast.

“Domingo Rodríguez will be our right hand man and our eyes in the province and other areas such as Espaillat and the Northeastern area…”

The Minister of the Environment and Natural Resources, Jaime David Fernández Mirabal, introduced Domingo Rodríguez as the new director of the Environment Ministry in Santiago and the regional coordinator of the Ministry in Espaillat and other provinces of the Northeast.

Mr. Rodríguez will act as the regional authority to deal with all environmental issues in the province, according to Mr. Fernández Mirabal. “Domingo Rodríguez will be our right hand man and our eyes in the province and other areas such as Espaillat and the Northeastern area, starting in the coming months. The businesses that are seeking authorization should now be able to receive a response in no more than 60 days. This new office will serve as the final authority and people will not have to come to Santo Domingo to seek responses,” Minister Fernández Mirabal said.

The naming of Rodríguez is the beginning of the process of implementation of regional management offices, the new administrative order according to which the Environmental Ministry will operate on a national level. This plan seeks to create offices with representatives from all the deputy secretariat offices to be placed under the supervision of the director as the main authority.

Educational Campaign in the Protected Areas

During the presentation of the new Environmental Director in Santiago before the press, personalities and businesspeople, the first part of nationwide campaign was also introduced: “Our Protected Areas: The Door that Takes Us Back to the Green,” which is one in a series of three videos.

The videos, with an educational focus, are called “National System of Protected Areas,” “Los Haitises National Park,” and “Biodiversity, Threatened Species and Sea Turtles.”

The micro report about Los Haitises explains that this national park places the Dominican Republic as one of the four points on the planet with karstic formations, stone reliefs of meteorological chemical origins formed from certain rocks such as dolomite or limestone, and made up of water-soluble minerals. This area is a strategic water, flora and fauna reserve of national security importance, the management of which is in the process of being recovered and reinforced in terms of vigilance through the Undersecretary of Protected Areas and the National Service for Environmental Protection (SENPA).

The article about the sea, or marine, turtles underscores the importance of Article 141 of Law 64-00 which points out the privileged situation of our coastline where four of the eight marine species that exist in the world today can be found: the Carey, the Green Turtle, the Caguamo and the Tinglar which makes our coasts the largest and most reproductive area in the Caribbean.

Fernández Mirabal stressed that our protected areas are truly living reserves and hold a wide range of ecosystems with three large mountain ranges, five hill systems, three regions with karstic formations, four coastal plains, four valleys and five highland areas which are all resources with national and international ecological value.

José Augusto Izquierdo, Governor of Santiago, Jaime David Fernández Mirabal, Environment Minister and Domingo Rodríguez, Director and Regional Coordinator of the Environment in Santiago.