Flint Water Crisis Timeline

[seemslikeadream]

“At the very least he should resign! At the very least,” Damon told The Daily Beast. “Listen, everybody’s entitled to a fair trial in the United States of America, but that man should get one. And soon. That’s just my personal opinion.”

Matt Damon Calls on Michigan Governor Rick Snyder to Resign Over Flint Water Crisis
The Oscar-nominated actor and co-founder of Water.org spoke to The Daily Beast about the federal emergency in Flint and his nonprofit’s efforts to end the global water crisis.
The images are shocking. Brown tap water resembling diarrhea. Young children’s faces covered in lesions. For over 18 months, the people of Flint, Michigan, complained that their water was contaminated, but their voices fell on deaf ears. Now it’s been declared a federal emergency, with experts estimating that roughly 8,000 to 9,000 children under the age of 6 may have suffered permanent brain damage after being exposed to high levels of lead in the city’s water supply, not to mention countless adults.
Redacted emails released under the Michigan Freedom of Information Act have since revealed that Gov. Rick Snyder’s administration was aware of Flint’s water problems almost a year ago but neglected to act or even inform the public until it was too late. The revelation has led to sharp criticism from Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, with the latter calling for Gov. Snyder to resign.
Matt Damon, the Oscar-nominated actor who, as the co-founder of the successful nonprofit Water.org, is something of an expert on safe drinking water and sanitation, has echoed Sen. Sanders in calling for Snyder to step down.
“At the very least he should resign! At the very least,” Damon told The Daily Beast. “Listen, everybody’s entitled to a fair trial in the United States of America, but that man should get one. And soon. That’s just my personal opinion.”

Damon—along with his fellow Water.org co-founder Gary White—was on hand at the Sundance Film Festival to discuss his charity’s recent “Buy a Lady a Drink” campaign. It’s a team-up with Stella Artois that sheds light on how, among the 663 million people around the world without access to safe water, it’s women who are disproportionately affected. So every hand-designed Stella Artois chalice purchased will provide one person with five years of clean water. Last year, Water.org brought five years of clean water to over 290,000 women in developing countries.

“In terms of the work that we do, to see it happening in Flint, every parent in America feels it on a visceral, deep level, because we ask the question, ‘What if that was my child?’” said Damon. “It’s unconscionable in Flint, and it’s unconscionable that 663 million people around the world are dealing with that every day in the developing world. Those are the communities we interact with, and that’s the mission of Water.org: to end that suffering for those children, and those parents.”
“We should be outraged about Flint,” added White. “That shouldn’t be happening in the United States, but it also drives home the point that it shouldn’t be happening anywhere. Flint is the reality for many developing countries around the world.”
That Flint is a majority African-American city where approximately 42 percent of its people live in poverty has raised questions over whether race played a factor in the city’s slow response to the crisis.
“I’ll tell you what, if the kids in a rich suburb of Detroit had been drinking contaminated water and being bathed in it, there would’ve been action,” said Hillary Clinton.
Damon acknowledged that race has played a factor in not only the water crisis in Flint, but also in our attitude toward water crises in developing countries.
“My sincere hope for our country and our world is that this greater connectivity is going to lead to a greater empathy and an awakening to the plight of our fellow citizens,” he said. “These are huge systemic injustices we’re talking about that hopefully everybody is waking up to. The question then is, what do we do about it? It will be interesting to see where we go from here.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEtJNMGa8fE

[seemslikeadream]

Did Snyder release all Flint e-mails? Maybe not.
Rochelle Riley, Detroit Free Press Columnist 10:47 a.m. EST January 22, 2016
Did Gov. Rick Snyder release all of his e-mails or not? One state representative says no, and has proof.


A state legislator and former Flint City Council member charged Thursday that Gov. Rick Snyder has misled the public by not releasing all of the e-mails about the Flint water crisis, including one the representative sent a year ago saying that “the city of Flint stands on the precipice of civil unrest” over not having clean drinking water.

State Rep. Sheldon Neeley, who as a city councilman was barred by a Snyder-appointed emergency manager from filing suit over the water, said he reached out to the governor Jan. 29, 2015, because residents were upset about “boiled water advisories, and things were not going on in an appropriate fashion." His letter asked for an executive order to forgive water fund loan balances totaling $20 million so Flint could rebuild the city's infrastructure, fix the water and "minimize the potential for litigation against" the city and state.

On the telephone Thursday, the governor's spokesman, David Murray, chuckled about the letter.

"Oh, I remember seeing that," he said. He said he didn't want to embarrass Neeley by pointing out that the letter -- which was titled "Letter of Appeal for Flint" and was cc'ed to then Lt. Gov. Dick Posthumus, chief of staff Dennis Muchmore, Clyde Edwards and Kiersha Speech -- went to the wrong address.


You see, Neeley sent the letter to governorsoffice@michigan.gov, an e-mail address for constituents -- regular people -- that gets, Murray said, "thousands and thousands of letters" from, well constituents -- the people who pay taxes, the people who include some who may have helped elect the governor, people with concerns.

How could anyone associated with the Snyder administration read that -- and ignore it, or worse have a laugh?

Electronic reproduction of email provided by Rep. SheldonBuy Photo
Electronic reproduction of email provided by Rep. Sheldon Neeley (Photo: Free Press)

Murray said he was the one who sent Neeley's letter to the governor a month later. It was just before Snyder announced a $2-million grant to find out what was wrong with Flint water. It would be months before the Department of Environmental Quality would learn, then admit, that lead was poisoning the water.

Snyder himself declined to comment, but the questions for him are: Where were you? Did you read the letter? And if your staff told you about the letter, did it not present a situation serious enough to declare a state of emergency and begin testing residents? And where were you for the months afterward? When the problem was discovered to be lead, did no one on your staff think you should know?

Neeley's complaint to the governor came three months before a March 2015 consultant's report that recommended spending $50,000 to add corrosion control chemicals to Flint's drinking water because iron was leaching from the pipes and turning the water brown.

The disclosure of the Snyder e-mail and a second one Neeley to State Attorney General Bill Schuette in September asking for an investigation into the Flint water delivery crisis came two days after Snyder promised in his annual status report to fix the Flint water problem.

Schuette, who declined to investigate last fall, is investigating now.

Could Neeley's complete letter have been omitted because he wrote that "community health could be on the decline as citizens become afraid to even shower or bathe in their homes. The people of Flint bring bottles of brown water full of sediment and other foreign substances to community meetings, asking only to be treated as human beings."

Nobody read that but the press secretary? Michigan deserves to hear those words this week. Flint deserves it.

“It’s really hard to figure out who are the accessories to the crime being committed against this city and who are the allies to fix this massive problem that we facing,” Neeley said. “I think the governor has more to say to the people of Michigan, and he is reluctant to say it. He’s being selective about what truths he wants to release.”

Understandably, Flint residents and some elected leaders are not sure whom to trust and wonder whether all that needs to be done will be done – for residents and for the children.

"The frustration hasn't subsided yet,” Neeley said. “My frustration has grown with individuals who are very dismissive of the Flint community and their concerns."

The question to be asked now may not be: What did they know and when did they know it?

The question may be: How could an intelligent, organized millionaire and former businessman have something happening in his state as catastrophic as the Flint water crisis -- and not know about it for 18 months?

Or: What kind of people did he choose to work for him that they would let this problem, which could have been resolved with a $100 additive or a $50,000 anti-corrosion treatment, get this big? And do they still work there?

And here's a third question: How could this happen to Flint? The Rev. Jeffery Hawkins, pastor of Prince of Peace Baptist Church just blocks from the Flint River, had an idea.

“I believe it’s a city that has been kicked so many times, and when it comes to voting, our numbers are not always the greatest numbers … because of that, I think that the governor just doesn’t care about the city,” Hawkins said. “But there are still human rights afforded, and he could have cared far more than he did. There’s no excuse for what he did, at the end of the day."

[seemslikeadream]

civil engineering professor who organized them and personally funded the project.

Virginia Tech Professor Marc Edwards Spent $147,000 to Help Uncover the Flint Water Scandal
The lead-contaminated water crisis in Flint, Michigan might have stayed hidden for much longer if it wasn't for the massive volunteer effort by a university research team and the civil engineering professor who organized them and personally funded the project.


Dr. Marc Edwards, an expert in water treatment, and his team of researchers at Virginia Tech sampled and tested Flint’s water in a study last year. This team provided the first comprehensive data that contradicted the city’s own claims that the water in Flint was safe.

Flint's water problems came to Edwards' attention when he was contacted by Flint resident LeeAnne Walters, according to a detailed Rolling Stone article. Walters, a mother, was concerned about the water's unpleasant smell, brownish hue, and seemingly toxic effects, and went looking for answers when state and local government were unresponsive.

[seemslikeadream]

Gov. Snyder lied: Flint water switch was not about saving money, records show

January 23, 201647 CommentsRead More

By Steve Neavling
Motor City Muckraker

The Flint water crisis that led to thousands of people being poisoned began because state officials maintained it would save the cash-strapped city money by disconnecting from the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department (DWSD) and using a different source.

But it turns out, DWSD offered the state-controlled city a deal that would have saved Flint more money by staying with Detroit.

An e-mail obtained by Motor City Muckraker shows the deal would have saved the city $800 million over 30 years, which was 20% more inexpensive than switching to the Karegnondi Water Authority.

A high-ranking DWSD official told us today that Detroit offered a 50% reduction over what Flint had been paying Detroit. In fact, documents show that DWSD made at least six proposals to Flint, saying “the KWA pipeline can only be attributed to a ‘political’ objective that has nothing to do with the delivery – or the price – of water.”

Gov. Rick Snyder
Gov. Rick Snyder
The offer by DWSD raises serious questions about whether Gov. Rick Snyder was lying when he insisted the water switch was motivated by saving money for Flint, which was under the control of a state emergency manager.

“When compared over the 30 year horizon the DWSD proposal saves $800 million dollars or said differently – saves 20% over the KWA proposal,” then-DWSD Director Sue McCormick said in the e-mail dated April 15, 2013.

The e-mail was first obtained by the Bill Johnson Group, a Detroit-based media consulting firm, and confirmed today by DWSD.

“If Snyder had accept this deal, the catastrophe would have been avoided,” Bill Johnson said.



Then-state Treasurer Andy Dillon signed off on the KWA deal in April 2013, which ultimately led to the emergency manager deciding to draw water from the Flint River until the city connected to a new regional system.

Soon after the switch, Flint residents began complaining that they were getting sick from the water. State officials dismissed the complaints, saying the discolored, foul-tasting water was just “aesthetic” and posed no health hazards, despite two studies that showed elevated lead levels, especially in children.

Finally, in October 2015, after thousands of residents were poisoned by lead, state officials acknowledged they erred.
“I believe now we made a mistake,” then-DEQ Director Dan Wyant, who resigned in December, wrote to Snyder on Oct. 18. “Because of what I have learned, I will be announcing a change in leadership in our drinking water program.”

Saying he was sorry for the mistake, Snyder pledged full transparency during his State of the State address last week and released e-mails related to the water crisis from 2014 and 2o15. Curiously, he refused to release e-mails from 2013, which would have showed why state officials decided to make the switch from DWSD to the KWA.

Now it seems clear why Snyder wouldn’t release the e-mails: They would have revealed that the switch was not about saving money.

So what was it about? Some have suggested that Snyder was motivated by a desire to break up DWSD and ultimately privatize it. In the summer of 2015, DWSD was split into two entities: the DWSD and the Great Lakes Water Authority.

Others have suggested that Snyder wanted to start fracking operations along a new pipeline.

Snyder’s office didn’t return calls for comment.

The e-mail about the proposal:


Screen Shot 2016-01-23 at 11.02.34 PM

Former Treasurer Andy Dillon still drawing $174,000 state salary following resignation


Michigan Treasurer Andy Dillon looks on during a meeting of the Michigan Strategic Fund Board of Directors on July 24 (Brandon Howell | MLive File
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on January 08, 2014 at 10:30 AM, updated January 08, 2014 at 3:55 PM


LANSING, MI -- Former Michigan Treasurer Andy Dillon, who resigned in October after a messy divorce, has continued to draw his full state salary as a senior advisor to his successor.

Dillon made $174,204 a year as treasurer, a pay rate he has maintained while assisting newly-appointed Treasurer Kevin Clinton, who earns the same salary.

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder, in accepting Dillon's resignation late last year, said he was pleased that Dillon "will remain available to assist the new treasurer with the transition," but the administration did not indicate he would remain on the payroll.

"This is a transition role and temporary," Snyder spokesperson Sara Wurfel said Wednesday. "It was deemed appropriate and instrumental due to complexity and urgency of local government fiscal health issues in Detroit and other parts of the state."

Treasury spokesman Terry Stanton said Dillon has assisted Clinton "with transition issues and has been working on local government fiscal issues." He is expected to conclude his advisory work in the next four to six weeks, at which time his pay will end.

As treasurer, Dillon oversaw an agency responsible for collecting, investing and disbursing all state monies. He played a key role in in state interventions for financially struggling cities and municipalities, including those run by emergency managers.

Dillon announced his resignation on October 11, citing a contentious divorce that played out in the press, but he stayed on as treasurer through the end of that month.

Update: Michigan Senate Minority Leader Gretchen Whitmer (D-East Lansing), in a release citing Dillon's "golden parachute" is calling for an independent review into Department of Treasury hiring practices, also noting previous reports that investment officials received major raises this year and are now amongst the highest-paid employees in state government. Michigan Democratic Party Chairman Lon Johnson has also called on Dillon and Snyder to "repay taxpayers." See their full statements in the comments section below.

[seemslikeadream]

Did I happen to mention that this is the guy who was in charge of overseeing the cadre of Emergency Managers around the state of Michigan?

Snyder-appointee Michigan State Treasurer Andy Dillon resigns to deal with messy divorce

by Eclectablog on OCTOBER 11, 2013 in EMERGENCY MANAGER LAW, EMERGENCY MANAGERS, RICK SNYDER

Former Democratic House Speaker Andy Dillon, appointed by Governor Rick Snyder as the state Treasurer, has resigned from his office to deal with messy divorce that was becoming more and more public as time went on. Dillon, who has also had problems with substance abuse, was recently accused by his ex-wife Carol Owens-Dillon of assault after he tried to take a cell phone from her that she alleges had incriminating texts on it.

“It is with mixed emotions that I announce I have tendered my resignation to Governor Snyder,” Dillon said in a statement.
“It has become clear to me — as it likely is to most — that it is unfair to my family and the residents of Michigan, to allow issues related to my recent divorce and the unfortunate acrimony associated with it to be a continued source of media attention and scrutiny.

“My family deserves privacy and our residents deserve to know their State Treasurer is not distracted by such issues and events. For these personal and professional reasons, I have determined it is in the best interests of all that I resign.

The story of their divorce is nearly as sordid as you could imagine, perhaps more so. I have, in fact, declined to write about because it was so tabloidesque. However, with him stepping down, I’m allowing myself this one and only post about it.

According to Owens-Dillon, the incriminating texts resulting in the alleged assault were racist slurs about Owens-Dillon’s African American boyfriend, Detroit News reporter Leonard Fleming. Owens-Dillon had taken a personal protection order out against Fleming though friends say the issue boiled down to Owens-Dillon being jealous of another girlfriend of his. She eventually dropped the suit.

Owens-Dillon also took out a PPO against her ex-husband after the alleged assault and this part is particularly sordid:

Wayne County judge garnished Dillon’s paycheck as Treasurer for failure to pay child support. According to court documents, Dillon owed his ex-wife, Carol Owens-Dillon nearly $5000 for three months of child support. […]
Then last week, the Motor City Muckraker reported that Carol Owens-Dillon filed personal protection order against Dillon claiming, “he rummaged through her Redford home, tried to break into her car and assaulted her in a furious search for racially charged text messages that he had sent from his state-issued phone”.

Dillon also allegedly texted Owens-Dillon’s cell phone threatening to release nude pictures of her engaging in inter-racial sex while doing cocaine. […]

Owens-Dillon alleges in the complaint, that she came home the next day on July 13 to find a drunk Dillon rummaging through her house looking for the copies of the text messages some of which contained racially charged derogatory comments about her African-American boyfriend. Owens-Dillon then claimed the confrontation the got physical, “He lunged at me from a bush and started grabbing and twisting my arms,” she told me. “I called 911, and he left.”

Dillon then used his power as a state official to try to silence his ex-wife. As she went to the Redford police station to file a report, she was confronted by two Michigan State Police Officers who demanded she turn over her ex-husband’s state issued cell phone and then bullied her into not filing a police report.

Dillon’s 17 year-old daughter, Teagan has also filed a personal protection order say that she feels “scared and helpless”. She cited an incident last Thanksgiving when Dillon pushed her mother to the ground in a drunken rage.

Finally, Owens-Dillon posted to her Facebook page the Dillon was having an affair with his administrative assistant, Amy Hichez, who subsequently sued Owens-Dillon.

Did I happen to mention that this is the guy who was in charge of overseeing the cadre of Emergency Managers around the state of Michigan?

Yeah, so, there’s that.

It’s obviously a good thing Dillon is no longer in that position of authority. It does, however, call into question the hiring practices of the Rick Snyder who portrays himself as the consumate businessman. If these are the sorts of decisions he’s made, that is a characterization that I would file under “extremely questionable”.

[Burnt Hill]

And right next door-

More than 60 Detroit Public Schools close Monday due to teacher sick-outs
.
WXYZ-TV Detroit | Channel 7

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_aeY1s_TPY&feature=youtu.be

wrkin90044 10 hours ago
the picture with the mushrooms growing inside the school was so sickening and disturbing

Maybe it was for psilocybin class?

[MinM]

Shocker...

Detroit Free Press ‏@freep 5 minutes ago

Did Snyder release all Flint e-mails? Apparently not.
http://on.freep.com/1Jng5tR @onetoughnerd

This is the timeline as I see it:

■ Snyder with the blessing of his benefactors (The Kochs, DeVos, and other ALEC fronted groups) starts their Chilean-esque takeover of poor black communities in Michigan.

■ Fast-forward to Flint and Snyder's emergency manager floats the idea that they could save a boatload of money by switching Flint from Detroit's water system to taking water from the Flint River.

■ Issues with that water are brought to light but Snyder and his people attempt to bury those findings.

■ The issue becomes such that Snyder can no longer control the narrative with people like Cher and Michael Moore bringing national attention to it.

■ Snyder finally admits to the problem and at first tries to dump it back on the local officials but is ultimately shamed into seeking federal assistance.

The bottomline is that Rick Snyder, and his corrupt as hell attorney general (Bill Schuette), likely had every reason in the world to believe that they could bury this or at least control the narrative. The GOP controls every branch of government in Michigan and thanks to Citizens United and gerrymandering that won't be changing any time soon. Not to mention that most of the news services in the State are totally in the bag for Snyder or at least the idea of Rick Snyder. So in the end, given the federal bailout, Snyder will likely end up skating on this.

So originally I thought Snyder would skate on this .. Maybe not so much now ..

SICKENING01.24.16 9:00 PM ET

Exclusive: Gov. Rick Snyder’s Men Originally Rejected Using Flint’s Toxic River
An emergency manager said no to using the river in 2012 after speaking to environmental regulators. An ex-Flint official said the governor’s office reversed that decision.

DETROIT — The emergency manager for Flint, Michigan, appointed by Gov. Rick Snyder in 2012, rejected using the city’s river as drinking water after consulting with the state’s environmental protection agency.

Snyder appointed Ed Kurtz to be Flint’s second emergency manager and Kurtz selected Jerry Ambrose to be the city’s chief financial officer. Both men were tasked by the Republican governor’s administration with restructuring the city’s government to save money after it was in danger of becoming insolvent. One cost-saving measure considered was to quit buying municipal water from Detroit.

In a civil deposition not reported until now, Ambrose testified under oath that emergency manager Kurtz considered a proposal to use the Flint River, discussed the option with the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, and then rejected it.

In 2014, Ambrose was deposed in a civil lawsuit brought by retired Flint municipal workers against the state over severe cuts to their health care benefits. Attorney Alec Gibbs questioned Ambrose about the water decision (a year before Flint learned it was being poisoned).

“There was brief evaluation of whether the city would be better off to simply use the Flint River as its primary source of water over the long term,” Ambrose said. “That was determined not to be feasible.”

“Who determined it wasn’t feasible?” Gibbs asked.

“It was a collective decision of the emergency management team based on conversations with the MDEQ that indicated they would not be supportive of the use of the Flint River on a long-term basis as a primary source of water,” Ambrose answered.

“What was the reason they gave?” Gibbs asked.

“You’ll have to ask them,” Ambrose said.

How could the river that was rejected as Flint’s permanent water source in December 2012 suddenly become suitable for consumption a mere 16 months later?

And who actually made the disastrous choice to start using the previously rejected river as the city’s temporary water source?

Howard Croft, the former director of public works for Flint who resigned in November 2015, asserted more than four months ago in a videotaped interview with the ACLU of Michigan that the decision to use the dangerously corrosive river came directly from the Snyder administration.

In the interview, Croft said that the decision to use the river was a financial one, with a review that “went up through the state.”

“All the way to the governor’s office?” the ACLU of Michigan asked him.

“All the way to the governor’s office,” Croft replied...

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2 ... river.html

[IanEye]

Michael Moore says he’s angrier than he’s ever been about the state of things. But Marc senses something softer in Michael’s personality these days. The filmmaker and activist sits down with Marc in the garage to discuss where that anger comes from, why he’s made a conscious choice to channel those feelings in a new direction, and how this all plays out in his latest film. - link

.

[seemslikeadream]

NE Ohio superintendent: Classes canceled amid more water tests
Lead, copper found in water tests

Published 7:01 AM EST Jan 25, 2016

SEBRING, Ohio (AP) —A school district canceled its Monday classes as more tests are being done in a northeast Ohio village where elevated levels of lead and copper were found in tap water.

Sebring Schools Superintendent Toni Viscounte said in an email Sunday the district will be closed on Monday. "Another round of testing is being done for precautionary reasons."

Sebring's city manager issued an advisory Thursday night that said children and pregnant women shouldn't drink the village system's tap water after seven of 20 homes where the water is routinely tested showed levels of lead and copper that exceeded U.S. Environmental Protection Agency standards.

Tests had showed lead levels at 21 parts per billion in the seven homes. The EPA standard is 15 parts per billion. Lead can cause serious health problems for infants and young children.

The Sebring water system serves around 8,100 customers in the Mahoning County communities of Sebring, Beloit and Maple Ridge. Sebring is about 60 miles southeast of Cleveland.

Classes had been canceled Friday for the Sebring school district's 650 students as a precaution.

Viscounte said the career center students will have school on Monday and the junior high basketball game will still go on. Bottled water and hand sanitizer will be given out, he added.

A posting on the district's website on Sunday morning had said the schools' water was safe and classes would resume Monday. The post was later removed and updated with one that classes were canceled "due to additional testing that the EPA has requested."

The schools' website said initial water testing was done by taking samples from a few areas in the school buildings, but tests have been requested for all water outlets in both buildings.

Ohio Environmental Protection Agency spokesman James Lee told WFMJ-TV in Youngstown (http://bit.ly/1nhejzO ) that the lead is not coming from the Sebring water treatment plant or the Mahoning River, where the village's system gets its water.

Lee said the agency believes the traces of lead and copper are coming from smaller distribution lines and possibly old homes with lead pipes.

"We are working with Sebring water treatment plant to make adjustments to minimize leaching of lead into the water," he said.

Volunteers handed out bottled water to residents over the weekend.

"Our primary focus is to distribute this water to pregnant women, infants and children," said Mahoning Emergency Management Agency Director Dennis O'Hara. "That is our primary focus. We are not going to turn anyone away, but we want to make sure we are hitting our target population that is most at risk according to Centers for Disease Control guidelines."

A blood lead screening clinic was held Sunday for area residents under age 6, along with pregnant or breastfeeding women who get their water from the village.

[seemslikeadream]

Former Detroit FBI chief to assist Flint water probe
Paul Egan, Detroit Free Press Lansing Bureau 6:44 a.m. EST January 25, 2016

LANSING — Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette announced Monday he has named Royal Oak attorney Todd Flood as a special outside counsel in his office's investigation of the lead contamination of Flint drinking water, and Flood will be assisted by Andrew Arena, the former FBI director in Detroit.

Schuette said in a news release he appointed a special counsel from outside his office to avoid potential conflicts of interest, since his office is also charged with defending the state and state officials in connection with civil lawsuits filed over the lead contamination.

"We will do our job thoroughly and let the chips fall where they may," Schuette said in a news release.

"This investigation is about beginning the road back to rebuild, regain and restore trust in government."

Schuette, a Republican who is expected to run for governor in 2018, announced his office was investigating whether any state laws were broken in the public health catastrophe on Jan. 15, after initially saying his office was not getting involved.


Flood is a former Wayne County prosecutor.

Arena, a Dearborn native, headed the Detroit FBI office during much of the City of Detroit public corruption investigation that led to the imprisonment of former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick. He now heads the Detroit Crime Commission, a nonprofit agency that works on dismantling criminal enterprises in the Detroit area.

"I am honored to return to public service on a case so important to the public trust," Arena said in the news release. "We will enter the investigation with open eyes and follow the facts, whatever the outcome, and Flint families and Michigan families will receive a full and independent report of our investigation."

Flnt's drinking water became contaminated with lead in 2014 after the city temporarily switched its source of supply to the Flint River as a cost-cutting move while under the control of a state-appointed emergency manager. State Department of Environmental Quality officials have admitted a mistake in not requiring corrosion control chemicals to be added to the water, resulting in lead leaching from pipes, joints and fixtures.

[seemslikeadream]

Closing the valve on history: Flint cuts water flow from Detroit after nearly 50 years




City employees and elected officials raise glasses of treated water from the Flint River during a toast in a ceremony stopping the intake of water from Detroit on Friday, April 25, 2014 at the Flint Water Treatment Plant. The city will use the Flint River as its primary water source as the Karegnondi Water Authority pipeline is built. Samuel Wilson | Mlive.com
Samuel Wilson
Print Dominic Adams | dadams5@mlive.com By Dominic Adams | dadams5@mlive.com

on April 25, 2014 at 4:52 PM, updated January 17, 2015 at 10:13 AM

FLINT, MI – It will take two days before Flint residents can taste history.

On Friday, April 25, Mayor Dayne Walling turned off the flow of water from Detroit and officially ended Flint’s nearly 50-year dependence on its neighbor to the south.

Officials said it will take about two days before the Flint River water will completely work its way through the treatment plant and flow from resident’s faucets.

The city plans to use the Flint River until the Karegnondi Water Authority pipeline is built, which will bring untreated Lake Huron water to Genesee County.

“Water is an absolute vital service that most everyone takes for granted,” Walling said. “It’s a historic moment for the city of Flint to return to its roots and use our own river as our drinking water supply.”

With about a dozen people looking on inside a small outbuilding at the Flint water treatment on the city's northside, Walling pressed a small black button switching the feed from green to red as people around counted down from three.

Beforehand, officials raised glasses of water in celebration.



Mayor Dayne Walling turns off the flow of water from Detroit as the Flint transitions to using the Flint River
Representatives from the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, as well numerous elected and city officials were at the Flint water treatment plant on Friday for the ceremonial closing of the valve from Detroit.

“Individuals shouldn’t notice any difference,” said Steve Busch, Lansing and Jackson district supervisor in the DEQ’s office of drinking water and municipal assistance.

He said Flint still had a final bacteria test that it passed Friday morning, allowing Flint to close the valve to Detroit.

Flint will use the river until the KWA builds its pipeline to Genesee County. The $274 million project is expected to be complete sometime in 2016.

“This is indeed the best choice for the city of Flint going forward,” said Flint Emergency Manager Darnell Earley.

When Walling flipped the switch, pumps powered down as water ceased flowing from the 36-inch water main from Detroit.

“There have been a lot of questions from our customers because this is such a major change,” he said. “When the treated river water starts being pumped into the system, we move from plan to reality. The water quality speaks for itself.”

Flint wanted had hoped to complete the turn off on Monday, but more work was needed on its disinfectant system.

“If we miss the date for shutting off the valve to Detroit – that doesn’t mean the project is a failure – that means we’re working on it,” Earley said.

“The Flint River is a different river than it was the last time we used it – that was pre-Clean Water Act,” Flint Utilities Director Daughtery Johnson told The Flint Journal last week, adding that the city made two years’ worth of improvements at the water plant in nine months. “It’s a great system. It’s a great asset the city has. Every drop we pull out, we’re going to clean and put right back in the river.”

Johnson said although the hardness of the water treated from the Flint River will be higher than it is now from Detroit, customers still shouldn't notice a difference. Higher hardness in water means it may take more water and soap to create a lather.

On April 17, the water treatment plant took in 12 million gallons of river water for treatment test runs that have been ongoing since.

Detroit terminated its contract with the city effective April 17 last year when Flint decided to purchase water through the KWA.

[seemslikeadream]

1/21/2016

Right-Wing Media Desperately Trying to Pin Blame For Flint Water Disaster on Democrats
It's pretty easy to pinpoint blame for the water crisis in Flint, Michigan. The Republican governor appointed an emergency manager to oversee Flint and strip authority away from the elected officials of the city. The different city managers in 2013 and 2014 signed off on a switch in the water supply from Detroit and Lake Huron to the polluted Flint River. Yes, the city council voted for the switch to save money, but that vote didn't matter since it was up to the city manager who was, as mentioned, appointed by the Republican governor. The results of tests of the water were either mishandled or suppressed by the state's Department of Environmental Quality. That's a department that is under the Republican governor.

So Republicans are to blame. Quite clearly. Quite directly. This ain't a stretch of logic. This ain't bullshit grasping at straws. A Republican appointing people to make decisions for a town is pretty much A+B=C, a straight fuckin' line here.

But not if you're one of the spooge-bucket carriers for the sniveling right-wing in this country. Oh, no, according to them, the blame rests with Democrats for mismanaging Flint for decades, thus leading to the appointment of the city manager, thus leading to lead-fucked kids.

That's not an exaggeration of the position of much of the conservative punditocracy. The fuckin' National Review (motto: "Hey, even we won't hire Bill Kristol") has an editorial titled, helpfully, "Flint Is Not a Republican Scandal." The editorial gleefully points out that Darnell Earley, the emergency manager who was in place when the water supply change took place, is a Democrat, which is true, except that he served at the pleasure of the Republican governor, Rick Snyder, who most recently appointed him the emergency manager of the Detroit public schools, which is going about as well as you might imagine.

By the way, the Michigan Democratic Party called on Snyder to fire Earley because of his fuck-ups on the water. By the way, the emergency manager before Earley, who signed the executive order on switching water, Ed Kurtz? He's a Republican. Oh, and, by the way, the water switch? It had to be signed off on by the state government run, as you know, by Republicans.

Inflamed bunion John Nolte of that shithole of thought, Breitbart, goes even further: "The city of Flint, Michigan, has been imploding since the 1980’s. Now, due to mismanagement by city officials, the water is poisoned with lead. In every way imaginable, the city is an arm-pit. But how is that possible when Utopian-Democrats have run the city unchallenged for years? How is that possible when in 2006, Flint was voted the 10th most liberal city in America?"

Kevin Williamson of National Review says much the same: "Flint, like big brother Detroit down the way, has a long history of political dominance by the Democratic party. Its current mayor is a Democrat; so was her predecessor; the mayor before him, Don Williamson, was a career criminal (he did time for various scams some years back) and a Democrat who resigned under threat of recall."

At FrontPage, another conservative cockknob magazine, another cockknob writes, "Democrats turned Flint into a deadbeat city. A deadbeat city with high crime, high rates of structure fires, lots of potholes and failing services. Flint, Detroit, Newark, Oakland, Chicago and a hundred other failed and failing cities are their handiwork...Flint’s dirty water originated with its dirty Democratic Party overlords. Blaming Republicans won’t clean it up."

You know what's missing from all of these articles about how the poor, deluded people of Flint keep electing Democrats who keep them poor and deluded? The fucking collapse of the fucking auto industry that caused the closure of the GM plants in the 1980s, reducing the jobs in that field there by over 90% as of this year, from 80,000 to around 5000. You want to head back in time to lay blame? You better go a little further back than just the last couple of administrations in the city.

The conservative logic on this is that Flint was asking to get raped by Republicans because Democrats had dressed it so slutty.

The problem is that the governor's office roofied Flint. We know that by the emails, which show, at best, that Snyder's office wanted to close its eyes and pretend the poisoning of a 100,000 people wasn't happening. At worst, it just didn't care. And, frankly, it doesn't matter what party was involved. Someone should be arrested.

Paul Krugman: The Flint Water Disaster Was No Accident
"What we see in Flint is an all too typically American situation of (literally) poisonous interaction between ideology and race," Krugman writes.
By Sarah Lazare / AlterNet January 25, 2016

The poisoning of Flint, Michigan's water--and irreversible harm to the city's children--was no mere accident, Paul Krugman argued in his Monday column.

The nightmare stems from a disturbing trend in which hard-line right-wingers are rejecting their most basic responsibilities to safeguard public health and safety--particularly where that public is low-income and majority African-American.

This trend is neither new nor isolated, the economist argues. And like London's Great Stink of 1858, the resultant crises only elicit official action when their stench reaches the halls of power. Krugman writes:

In the 1850s, London, the world’s largest city, still didn’t have a sewer system. Waste simply flowed into the Thames, which was as disgusting as you might imagine. But conservatives, including the magazine The Economist and the prime minister, opposed any effort to remedy the situation. After all, such an effort would involve increased government spending and, they insisted, infringe on personal liberty and local control.

It took the Great Stink of 1858, when the stench made the Houses of Parliament unusable, to produce action.

But one does not have to look back more than 150 years to find a historical precedent. Krugman notes that, in the 21st century, the Flint crisis is already in good company:

[A] funny thing has happened as hard-line conservatives have taken over many U.S. state governments. Or actually, it’s not funny at all. Not surprisingly, they have sought to cut social insurance spending on the poor. In fact, many state governments dislike spending on the poor so much that they are rejecting a Medicaid expansion that wouldn’t cost them anything, because it’s federally financed. But what we also see is extreme penny pinching on public goods.

It’s easy to come up with examples. Kansas, which made headlines with its failed strategy of cutting taxes in the expectation of an economic miracle, has tried to close the resulting budget gap largely with cuts in education. North Carolina has also imposed drastic cuts on schools. And in New Jersey, Chris Christie famously canceled a desperately needed rail tunnel under the Hudson.

In the case of Flint, public outrage and global attention have finally forced Michigan Governor Rick Snyder to issue a tepid apology and shine some light on his administration’s dismissal and potential cover-up of the mass poisoning. It did not go unnoticed that the state's undemocratic emergency manager scheme enabled a related water disaster in Detroit, which--like Flint--is poor and majority African-American.

Yet public exposure does little to fix the lead poisoning of a city, which can cause “profound and permanent adverse health effects, particularly affecting the development of the brain and nervous system,” according to the World Health Organization. What's more, it is not clear if growing grassroots calls for Snyder's removal--and even arrest--will be heeded.

But according to Krugman, while the Flint crisis is certainly human-made, there is no single culprit behind “Michigan’s Great Stink.”

“What we see in Flint is an all too typically American situation of (literally) poisonous interaction between ideology and race,” Krugman notes, “in which small-government extremists are empowered by the sense of too many voters that good government is simply a giveaway to Those People.”

[seemslikeadream]

Flint Residents Told That Their Children Could Be Taken Away If They Don’t Pay For City’s Poison Water
Not only is the Michigan government poisoning residents, but now they are threatening to take their children for not paying for it.
By John Vibes / The Free Thought Project January 24, 2016


Flint, MI – As the water crisis in Flint deepens, it is becoming apparent that the effects of the lead-infested water are not just a health hazard, but the situation has the potential of ruining many more lives outside of the poison issue. There is no denying that the water in Flint is undrinkable and that it is contaminated with lead and other substances, and it is clear that the government of Flint is responsible for the problem.

However, the city’s government continues to charge people for the poison water and then threatening to foreclose their home or take their children if they refuse to pay. Michigan law states that parents are neglectful if they do not have running water in their home, and if they chose not to pay for water they can’t drink anyway, then they could be guilty of child endangerment. Activists in Flint say that some residents have already received similar threats from the government if they refuse to pay their bills.

Flint residents have recently filed two class action lawsuits calling for all water bills since April of 2014 to be considered null and void because of the fact that the water was poisonous.

“We are seeking for the court to declare that all the bills that have been issued for usage of water invalid because the water has not been fit for its intended purpose,” said Trachelle Young, one of the attorneys bringing the lawsuit said in court.

“Essentially, the residents have been getting billed for water that they cannot use. Because of that, we do not feel that is a fair way to treat the residents,” Young added.

Recent estimates have indicated that it could take up to 15 years and over $60 million to fix the problem, and the residents will be essentially forced to live there until the problem is solved. Despite the fact that the issue is obviously the government’s responsibility, they have made it illegal for people to sell their homes because of the fact that they are known to carry contaminated water. Meanwhile, residents are still left to purchase bottled water on their own, in addition to paying their water bill.

Although this problem is finally getting national media attention in Flint, they aren’t the only city with contaminated water supplies. In fact, a recent report published by The Guardian showed that public water supplies across the country were experiencing similar issues.

This crisis highlights the many dangers of allowing the government to maintain a monopoly on the water supply and calls attention to the fact that decentralized solutions to water distribution should be a goal that we start working towards.

[Pele'sDaughter]

This crisis highlights the many dangers of allowing the government to maintain a monopoly on the water supply and calls attention to the fact that decentralized solutions to water distribution should be a goal that we start working towards.

Are they talking about privatization? I hardly think that would be a wise solution either.

[seemslikeadream]

that's what started all of this.... Synder wanted to privatize Detroit Water and Sewerage Department (DWSD)



Gov. Snyder lied: Flint water switch was not about saving money, records show