Just keep the corporations happy.

K&R!

OS

(please don't tell me I'd actually need to put the sarcasm thingie here.)

Snyder put a manager in charge of Flint's finances and he sold them on the idea...pushed it through actually.

I guess I could blame the feckless Michigan Democratic Party for not having its act together well enough to keep Snyder from getting elected...but not as much as the Republicans that infest the Great Lakes State.

You're forgetting the part where Detroit cut off Flint's water supply years before the pipeline from Lake Huron was scheduled to be completed.

Can you link me?

http://www.mlive.com/news/flint/index.ssf/2013/04/detroit_gives_notice_its_termi.html

I remember reading it in the Detroit Free Press as well, but it'll probably take some time to dig up the article.

There does appear to be some hullabaloo about the wording of the letter from the Detroit Water and Sewage Department and what it necessarily implied ("ending the agreement" vs. "cutting off water&quot , but Detroit's motives are pretty clear. Flint purchased water from Detroit for 50 years -- so long that the City of Detroit considered it a reliable source of revenue. With Flint announcing its intention to back out of the deal, Detroit upped the ante by sending this notice. I suspect they wanted to terminate the current agreement so they could jack up the rates on Flint and gouge them for the four or five years it would take to complete the pipeline from Lake Huron.

Effectively, Flint's choices were: A) Pay Detroit more money for water, B) Fight Detroit in court, or C) pull water from the Flint River.

Option B is a non-starter; Detroit is embroiled in controversy over whether or not water is a fundamental right. Snyder doesn't think so, and he won't let a city under his appointed emergency manager help set the judicial precedent that it is. With Flint's finances in the shitter and (again) the city under Snyder's emergency manager, they would have to evaluate the relative costs of A and C. If C is cheaper than A, then the city pulls from the Flint River.

In my amateurish estimation, that's the cut of it.

I am in Flint township, which still gets water supplied via Detroit, although I am lucky enough to have a well.

Everyone who lives here knew that this whole water supply switch was a bad, bad idea. However, Governor Snyder doesn't care about the people in this state. He especially doesn't care about a city like Flint. He's runs this state with the same inept skills he used at Gateway Computers.

My question is, who benefited financially from this whole situation?

Snyder is terming out but I have a gut feeling he's going to try to run against Senator Stabenow, when she is up for re-election. I'm hoping that situation is the nail in his political coffin.

Snyder is excellent at message control. As soon as this scandal came out, he had press conferences about something something positive that he had done and this is the big story pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

The information that was given out was frightening.

It should come as NO surprise to anyone that nobody in Flint gives any credibility to anything that Snyder says. It's almost like he is on a mission to destroy the city. Most people would like to put him on a steady diet of Flint River water.

The people in this city have worked so hard to turn things around. Downtown Flint is, once again, an enjoyable place to be. Lots of great places to eat, great schools (UofM, Michigan State, Kettering (formerly GMI) Mott Community College, Baker University). Our cultural center is wonderful - great museum, planetarium and theaters.

I guess we made too much progress, so now Snyder has to resort to poisoning the citizens.

k and r

And all the other white privilege suburbs as well.

though I doubt there's oil wells around Detroit ...

http://thehill.com/regulation/227972-epa-prohibited-from-regulating-lead-bullets-court-says

https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&site=imghp&tbm=isch&source=hp&biw=963&bih=500&q=Gun+Ownership+Rates+By+State&oq=Gun+Ownership+Rates+By+State&gs_l=img.3..0.2149.11721.0.12113.28.18.0.10.10.0.183.1576.9j5.14.0....0...1ac.1.64.img..4.24.1604.WpkgxUmNBz0#imgdii=c8zUYYJWfhda7M%3A%3Bc8zUYYJWfhda7M%3A%3BR8EMPP0qIzqU7M%3A&imgrc=c8zUYYJWfhda7M%3A

http://www.mlive.com/news/flint/index.ssf/2013/01/flint_most-violent_large_city.html

I'm not saying it's a determining factor. I'm saying it's a contributing factor. The persistent use of lead bullets in America can be an underrated problem.

Lead bullets are not contributing to the blood lead levels in these children.

Interesting contribution nevertheless

We know entire species of migrating birds are impacted by the lead in bullets. And they end up being contaminated with lead through contact with waterways where lead ammunition has been used over the decades for hunting.

So yes, some of the lead probably did come from ammo. Not all, but some.

The water pulled from the Flint River is corrosive. It eats away at the city's antiquated plumbing, releasing particulate lead into the water supply.

article say who dumps into it. Why is that information omitted.

Why does journalism stop short at actually ferreting out the polluting culprits. I'm tired of corporate owners getting a pass on corporate dumping.

In an effort to be relevant, because the EPA's past fight against bullet contamination...

Here's a pretty picture of the concept of a watershed, but I'll bet the watershed sources of the Flint River look nothing like these.


Instead of adding to the mystery with outrage here, I'd suggest looking for those culprits.

"...In the city of Flint, the river flows past the sites of several former General Motors factories, most notably Chevrolet's first assembly plant, which was bisected by the river, and downtown through the campus of the University of Michigan–Flint and Riverbank Park. Also along the river front is the Flint Carriage Factory site, later Dort Motors. The Durant-Dort Carriage Company Office, now a historic landmark, is across the street. Continuing downstream, the river runs past Kettering University and McLaren Hospital, then into Flint Township and through Flushing. The stretch of the Flint River from downtown Flint to Kettering University is channelized with concrete sides...

...] On October 16, 2015, Flint switched back to the Detroit water system for its source of water..."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flint_River_(Michigan)

And no, it's not necessarily that obvious to 'everyone.'.

Uh, yeah. And the likely culprit is bullet contamination.

contaminations exist beyond pipes and dumpers.

I wasn't really trying. But someone asked why I said it at all. I wanted to leave the exploration of others toward EPA claims of lead contamination in other areas.

So I'll accept your trifling label for today.

Nice try.

Being all over hunting land, though, lead goes wherever water sheds.

The answer is simple chemistry: http://preparatorychemistry.com/NaCl_flash.htm

Chloride ions are corrosive. Chloride ions are produced when salts -- like sodium chloride -- react with water.

Now, what do we use to deice our roads come winter time?

A) Bullets
B) Sodium Chloride
C) Sodium Chloride
D) Sodium Chloride

I have relatives near Flint so I watched this story as it developed. The water from Detroit was treated to reduce the corrosivity, therefore the amount of lead picked up was kept to a minimum. For some reason, when the switch was made to draw water from the Flint River, they either didn't add, or weren't able to add the chemicals needed to limit the corrosive levels and more lead was dissolved in drinking water.

One thing I'm not clear on is why it was deemed necessary to pull water from the Flint River on a temporary basis until pipelines from Lake Huron were completed. It would have made more sense to leave things alone until everything was ready for the changeover.

Once Flint announced they would be getting their water from the Huron pipelines, Detroit responded by cutting off Flint's water supply, effective April 2014.

In retrospect, Flint probably should have fought the cutoff in court, but pulling water from the Flint River was, superficially, a more appealing option. Even while Flint was connected to Detroit's water supply, the Flint River was their backup option.

And publically reported on. How did this happen, what with the clean water act or all those damn government regulations?

that would require the republicans to quit trying to defund the EPA, and whats really amazing this agency was started under the criminal in chief Nixon about as far right wing as you could get besides a guy named Snyder and his criminal enterprize and lackeys in the legislature

I wonder if he gets bottled water and how much that is costing the citizens of the state--------------------it is absolutely amazing that this once unionized labor state kept voting in republicans based on the concept that these pukes would "cut taxes", ----------------------really, they were on the bottom of the big old pole, and now the citizens have to pay for the increase in health care to the kids, parents, grand parents, hell even the animal and vegetables they eat because there tainted with the water they have in the state------------------------------great forward thinking, instead of thinking for tomorrow there is the moment of the now syndrome



Honk---------------------for a politcal revolution it is about the U.S. Supreme Court and it is about getting a progressive Congress

Bernie 2016

taking care of the shit they caused, as you stated. Money to be made out of the fuck-ups of today.

its like your raised to have some common sense, so have some--------------------





Honk-----------------------for a political revolution it is about gettinga progressive U.S.Supreme Court and it is about getting a progressive Congress


Bernie 2016

But the problem here is that the lead isn't in the water at the source. The water that comes through the pipes is corrosive, which means that any lead that exists along the pipes in the streets and in houses will be pulled out into the water.

Lead sources in pipes can be in valves, faucets, solder (in older pipes) or in lead service lines (ie city owned pipes, but these were required to be removed over a decade ago across the country by EPA.)

Fancier faucets tend to have more lead issues- apparently as a side effect of the manufacturing. But even shutoff valves under the sink can be a problem.

The Pb concentrations in the river water are not high. The problem stems from the water being so "corrosive" to leach the Pb out of the old plumbing. That's damned corrosive.

The other effects being observed that are NOT Pb-related indicate more problems.

Somebody was asleep at the wheel on this one. Monitoring of drinking water is mandatory. What the hell happened?

There were two rounds of testing: once in December 2014, showing 6 ppb Pb, below EPA standards. The second round of testing, in June 2015, showed 11 ppb Pb, still below EPA standards. http://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/2015/10/10/missed-opportunities-flint-water-crisis/73688428/

The thing of it is, the water supply isn't contaminated with lead. The problem with the water is that it is corrosive, and picks up lead from the city's plumbing. So there could be variance in the test depending upon where one gathers the water. Not enough info to determine how the city managed to fuck this up.

I'm on the board at our local water company and we are required to conduct regular tests. After hiring a new plant manager a few years ago, we found out the old manager had been manipulating the tests to produce lower lead levels. This was a violation of stste and federal law and it put our small rural community at risk with drinking water that had higher lead levels.

Simply by avoiding testing homes most likely to have lead and flushing the water lines before collecting samples, he could get reports that assured our customers that the water was safe and the lead content was below federal limits. We thought everything was fine and relieved that we didn't have to raise rates and spend big bucks to correct lead problems that primarily comes from plumbing fixtures in older homes. We should have been more suspicious because most of the homes here would be considered as high-risk with service lines built before lead solder in plumbing was banned.

For the most part, the state accepts the test reports the water utility sends in, and there is no oversight to check whether they are testing properly. Govt agencies are only focused on enforcing the law and there is little help for small utilities, and we are at the top of acceptable levels now. There is no money to build treatment facilities to reduce lead and other heavy metal contaminants.

Still, I can't tell if it is malice or incompetence. Neither is excusable, of course.

To install a decent water purifier to the faucet which is attached to the main kitchen sink.

That way the many various rural water utilities can't affect people's health by altering the test results.

Is considered one of the causes for the crime epidemic that peaked in 1992.

So to say that this is criminal...

the lead in gasoline. We used to pick berries - blackberries - each spring in my younger days until they were ripped out because they tested, we were told, to have high lead levels from the highway near by. But this was in a mill town valley where all the crap spewing out of the mills beside the river valley would settle. God knows what was in those berries, but my mother put a hellofalot of sugar in those blackberry pies so that forgave a lot.

a continuation of what is portrayed in several Michael Moore films.

Just sayin'.

Well, I won't finish that sentence.

this is what they want. They want sick and impaired individuals. Less competition to do what they want with little interfearance.