SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — After the Puerto Rico Aqueduct and Sewer Authority (PRASA) failed to disclose monthly invoices, reports and other documents related to services provided by Truenorth Corporation, the Centro de Periodismo Investigativo (CPI) filed a legal petition against the agency Tuesday to compel the release of the information.

Two months after CPI journalist Amanda Pérez Pintado first requested the information, the news organization turned to the San Juan Superior Court under Puerto Rico’s Transparency and Expedited Procedure for Access to Public Information Act (Act 141-2019).

Although Pérez Pintado complied with the law and its amendments by directing her requests to PRASA Executive President Luis González Delgado, Communications Department Director Gian Paul Luciano Ramos and other agency information officers, she never received the information.

“The PRASA doesn’t even explain why it fails to respond to information requests like this one. This administration simply ignores the requests it receives, time and again. This is another case showing that the amendments this administration made to the Transparency Act did nothing to solve the problem. They just gave the government more time to avoid responding,” said CPI Executive Director Carla Minet.

This is the second time in 2026 that the news organization has sued the PRASA for failing to release public information. The first lawsuit was filed in March after the agency failed to provide progress reports on the reconstruction of the main sewer line in Arecibo’s Barrio Puntilla. After winning that case, the CPI published the investigation “An 8-Month, $1M Fix Became an 8-Year, $19.3M Sewer Repair in Arecibo.”

“The PRASA loses more than half the water it produces, and despite spending millions in public funds to diagnose the problem, it has been unable to solve it,” said Pérez Pintado, who, along with Víctor Rodríguez Velázquez, published investigations into how the PRASA paid companies $50 million to address water losses, only for the problem to worsen, and how the agency allocates just 4% of its funds to pipe repairs as water losses increase.

“The requested information will help the public understand what is being done to address a problem that has persisted for decades. People have a right to know how a resource as vital as water is managed,” Pérez Pintado added.

The lawsuit was filed after the news organization exhausted all administrative remedies available to it.

The legal petition was filed by attorneys Giselle Lombardi González, Luis José Torres Asencio and Steven P. Lausell Recurt, along with law clinic students Carlos Serrano Negrín, Daniela Talavera Pagán and Melany Ortiz Rolón of the Access to Information Project at the Inter American University of Puerto Rico Law School.

This translation was generated with the assistance of AI and reviewed by our editorial team to ensure accuracy and clarity.