Michigan Governor And His Staff Treated Flint Like It Was Filled With Throwaway People
People in Flint, Michigan are now facing an irreversible health crisis due to lead in their water.
According to the date on an email -- July 2015 -- Snyder's then-chief of staff, Dennis Muchmore, knew at least this summer. Yet, only on Tuesday did the governor declare a state of emergency due to the lead in the water supply.
Text from that email from Muchmore to a health-department official in July 2015 (via the Graham story linked below):
I'm frustrated by the water issue in Flint I really don't think people are getting the benefit of the doubt. Now they are concerned and rightfully so about the lead level studies they are receiving. These folks are scared and worried about the health impacts and they are basically getting blown off by us (as a state we're just not sympathizing with their plight).
People don't want you to sympathize that their child is getting irreversible brain damage from lead in the water. They want you to stop it -- like it's your own child -- and that would be your responsibility as a public official; especially one in a position of power.
How anybody can just shrug off all those babies and others being ruined by the water, I just can't comprehend.
It gets worse. According to an Alana Semuels story in The Atlantic in July, 2015, residents believe that the city knew about the water problems as soon as May 2014.
David A. Graham writes in The Atlantic:
On Tuesday, Governor Rick Snyder declared a state of emergency due to lead in the water supply. The same day, the U.S. Department of Justice announced that it is investigating what went wrong in the city. Several top officials have resigned, and Snyder apologized. But that's only so comforting for residents. They're drinking donated water supplies--though those donations are reportedly running dry--or using filters. Public schools have been ordered to shut off taps. Residents, and particularly children, are being poisoned by lead, which can cause irreversible brain damage and affect physical health. It could cost $1.5 billion to fix the problem, a staggering sum for any city, much less one already struggling as badly as Flint is....On Thursday, while declaring the state of emergency, Snyder wouldn't say when he became aware of the lead problem in Flint. The governor--a trained engineer who likes to portray himself as a can-do manager--reportedly grew testy when asked repeatedly about his own awareness.
Aging Pipes Are Poisoning America's Tap Water
The problem dates back to April 2014, when Flint was under the direction of an emergency manager appointed by the state to try to fix the broken city. (Michigan law provides for the governor to select managers, and the provision has been used in several places in recent years, most prominently Detroit.) To save money, the city began drawing its water from the Flint River, rather than from Detroit's system, which was deemed too costly. But the river's water was high in salt, which helped corrode Flint's aging pipes, leaching lead into the water supply.
The move saved millions, but the problems started becoming apparent almost immediately. The water starting smelling like rotten eggs. Engineers responded to that problem by jacking up the chlorine level, leading to dangerous toxicity. GM discovered that city water was corroding engines at a Flint factory and switched sources. Then children and others started getting rashes and falling sick. Marc Edwards, a Virginia Tech environmental-engineering professor, found that the water had nearly 900 times the recommend EPA limit for lead particles. As my colleague Alana Semuels noted in a deeply reported feature in July 2015, residents believe the city knew about problems as soon as May 2014. Yet as late as February 2015, even after tests showed dangerous lead levels, officials were telling residents there was no threat.
You'd better believe that if this happened in Bloomfield Hills (richville), they'd have cared fast. But Flint is packed to the gills with the poor and uninfluential.
This shows -- in a truly sick and horrible way -- what I've seen locally and nationally: It's just bullshit that we get "equal representation." Money talks, and it's the rare elected official who doesn't jump when the money says jump -- and do very little when the money isn't there flapping in the direction of "Do something!"
I've been following this story with a sort of sick fascination, since it so close to home.
With a suitable caveat that 'elevated' lead levels can have many implications, from serious health effects to nothing at all (nobody is quoting serum lead levels, all anyone will say is 'elevated', which can mean anything or nothing)-
This is a perfect example of what happens when you have 4 or 5 government departments and agencies with wildly-different agendas, all working on an issue like dogs fighting over a bone. At least 2 agencies had a strong vested interest in there NOT being a public-health problem with Flint's water, and once the problem was unequivocally exposed, the blamestorming and crawfishing is just shameful to behold.
Lesson here is that the state and its workers will happily let people suffer all kinds of harm if doing otherwise places their agencies or their employees at risk. The state is not your friend, and needs to be monitored aggressively, maybe even-more aggressively than one would monitor a private entity. Flint's long-term culture of dependency on state and Federal handouts probably didn't help either.
One quibble with the article - Governor Snyder is not 'a trained engineer' of any sort - he is an accountant and financial manager. The worst sort of person to have in charge of a technically-rooted challenge such as this, since he must take what his tech people tell him at face value. I am (frankly) surprised at him for not recognizing the vested interests of the various people reporting to him, and weighing their input in light of their interests. It would appear that Mr Muchmore could figure out what was going on, as COS he must have said as much to his boss. Maybe Governor Snyder didn't want to hear it, maybe he trusted what he was hearing from his agencies more than what he was hearing from his COS, in which case, more fool the Governor.
llater,
llamas
llamas at January 11, 2016 3:43 AM
Agree w/llamas.
Testing drinking water is probably mandated by both State and Federal regulations so this is not a "new" problem.
Differing agendas, not treating this as a criminal (EPA?) offense if not acted upon quickly, and scheduling numerous "meeting" to discuss the issue created a health issue.
(Interesting that the reporter (knowingly?) took a whack at the Gov that way. Only someone local enough but also objective enough would pick it up. Jeesh. Got to worry about the guard dogs as well now.)
Bob in Texas at January 11, 2016 3:56 AM
Agree with llamas. This is a cautionary tale to all of you who think Big Daddy Government is going to take care of you and all of your problems. Government should always be viewed with suspicion. Someone needs to go to jail for this.
Sheep Mom at January 11, 2016 10:04 AM
I don't know about jail time. But the appointed manager needs to lose his job.
As I understand things, this is what happened (from this and a few other sources):
1. City of Flint ran into the red for too long and was declared bankrupt.
2. Governor appointed a manager.
3. A major cost was identified, expensive water from Detroit.
4. City manager and council agreed a change needed to be made. An alternate source of water was found and contracts were started. Some infrastructure needed to be built to access this water.
5. City manager noticed there was a gap between Detroit cutting Flint off and the new water being available.
6. City manager decided to reopen the local water treatment plant and get water from the local river until the new water became available.
7. City engineers screwed up at the treatment plant. After a variety of errors the water ended up leaching lead out of the city's old pipe joints. Now the pipes leak and the water has lead and sediment in it. (Probably ground erosion as well)
If I'm wrong on something please let me know. But from this I don't see a criminal situation. I know there was a cover up or ignoring the problem, but I can't get reliable information about that.
Ben at January 11, 2016 11:07 AM
Also, once the engineers screwed up at the water treatment plant it doesn't look like there is a solution other than digging up all the old water mains and replacing them. An expense the bankrupt city can ill afford.
Ben at January 11, 2016 11:10 AM
The problem dates farther back than that.
It sounds to me like The Atlantic took a few cheap shots at a Republican governor for what is essentially a city-government-caused issue (bankruptcy, water management); including misidentifying him as a "trained engineer" so his failure to act on a technology issue will seem even worse.
If the emergency manager could look at the city's water supply costs and determine that they were out of line, why couldn't the pre-bankruptcy city management do that? And why did the city start purchasing expensive water from Detroit in the first place? The Atlantic had nothing to say about the previous administration's incompetence. Wonder why?
Since Michael Moore loves Flint so much, maybe he'll chip in a few dollars.
/sarcasm
Conan the Grammarian at January 11, 2016 11:50 AM
I have many friends who,live in places where the well water is not potable.
However humans only drink a gallon or so a day.
Somehow they manage to deal with it, without government getting involved.
Correct me if I am wrong, but aren't there a number of filters commercially available that will remove lead, and other heavy metals from tap water?
I don't drink tap water anyway. Except boiled for green tea. I think I could mange if the water where I live was Las Vegas bad. (Nasty tasting stuff).
Isab at January 11, 2016 1:10 PM
I saw the Flint water treatment and flocculation plant in 1993 as part of a science field trip for the smart kids. They kept it as a "last line of defense" against Flint running out of water. It smelled horrible. It had not aged well. The man who walked out on the beam and added the chemicals to make the water "safe" would not drink it.
ElVerdeLoco at January 11, 2016 3:08 PM
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