Flint Water Crisis

An attempt to save money by changing water sources by an indifferent government caused hundreds of millions of dollars in damages, negative health effects, and a total loss in faith in the government of Michigan. Although measures have been taken to mitigate these problems, their effects have already marred the city of Flint and its

The contamination began in April 2014 after the source of the town’s water supply was switched from Lake Huron to the Flint river in order to reduce governmental costs. This was done despite the fact that the Flint River had a strong history of pollution. Among this pollution included car parts, a dead body, and high levels of chemicals. (Semules par 5). Once the pipes were switched there were several complaints of the water having a foul smell and metallic taste (Foley par 4). In the beggining the government denied that anything was wrong despite the fact that lab examinations of the water proved otherwise. Two years after the Flint water crisis gained media attention, the Senate passed a bill that would provide Flint residents with water, but this is

The city of Flint is 70 miles away from the costs of the Great Lakes which hold the greatest sources of fresh water, yet there residents still can't get clean tap water. 15% of homes in Flint Michigan are boarded up ,40% of the people are in poverty , high unemployment rate, and consistently on a list for most dangerous places to live in the nation .In an attempt to cut budget cost in 2014 Flint stop getting pre treated water from the city of Detroit . Problems began when the city started using water from the Flint river .Flint River is 19 times more corrosive than Lake Huron (Detroit water source) . City and state officials denied for months that there was a serious problem by that time, supply pipes had sustained major corrosion and lead

The Flint water crisis has left no one from the damage, even the pets are getting sick of the poisoned water. That was what residents Lee and Ernie of Flint Michigan saw with their cat. Flint is a city in Michigan with a total population of approximately one hundred thousand residents. The issue with the water for Flints and its residents stated in 2014 when the city decided to switch from their water resource from the city of Detroit to a local river. Immediately after the switch residents filed complaints about the water’s smell and color. In Ryan Felton’s “Flint’s Water Crisis: What went wrong,” it is apparent that the crisis should not have happened, and that flint was neglected just because it was an impoverished city.

In January of 2015, Flint was found to be in violation of the Safe Drinking Water Act after disinfection byproducts were detected at alarming rates (NPR, 2016). Water was somehow still deemed safe for consumption, as the city was very passive in its advisories. Although E. coli, coliform bacteria, and disinfection byproducts were very serious and harmful substances found in the water supply, they would not be the main issue.

The people of Flint did not keep their mouths shut when they seen all the worrisome problems that popped up. Flint can thank one woman in particular for bringing the nation’s attention to what was happening. LeeAnne Walters is a thirty-seven year old mother of four who was not going to sit around while her family was withering away. She knew there was a serious problem not being dealt with in the summer of 2014. Her three-year-old twins got a rash when they had a bath. She could no longer leave them in the tub to soak. One of her twins had extreme reactions to the water. Gavin’s skin would become scaly and red where the water line stopped. Later her water turned brown and her family avoided tap water as much as possible. The twins got a bath in bottled water each week and bath with baby wipes the other days. Over time, the symptoms slowly disappeared (Lurie). Simple tasks like brushing their teeth, bathing, and cooking were incredibly complicated and expensive. Gavin and Garrett were not the only ones being affected. Her son had numerous trips to the hospital for abdominal pain, all the members of her family were losing hair, and at one point she lost her eyelashes. In January 2015, Flint declared that the city's water had dangerous levels of trihalomethanes. That came from the disinfectant that was supposed to treat the water. Exposure to these chemicals can cause liver, kidney, and nervous system

In April of 2014 Flint, Michigan started to get their water from the Flint River rather than the Detroit river that was formerly used as the main water source in hopes of saving money. The water being provided has been classified by Flint residents as smelly and murky and is avoided at all costs. It has also been discovered to cause damage to the lead pipes that transported it throughout the city. Children have been found to have high levels of lead in their blood and this may be the cause of an outbreak of Legionnaire’s disease which has killed 10 people in the Flint area. People have also reported rashes from the dirty water. Video news interviews show residents holding water that is

“Water is a human right”-  Michigan Nurses. Due to a lack of financial resources and government funding, the city of  Flint, Michigan began to make budget cuts. One major budget cut was the waterway from Lake Huron to Flint. Government officials decided on connecting Flint to the Flint river, which has previously raised infestation problems. After the major switch city occupants commenced to complain about the smell and taste of at home tap water.

There currently is a problem in the US with the government and how they cut corners with the water problem in Flint, Michigan. About two years ago, Michigan’s government decided they would save money by switching the water supply in Flint, Michigan. Before, Flint was getting their water from Lake Huron. Now, they are getting their water from the Flint River, known by it’s filth through the people of Flint. When reporters interviewed long-time residents of Flint they were shocked at the decision. The decision was supposed to be temporary, it wasn’t planned for it to go on for almost two years. Soon after the switch, the people of Flint saw the water didn’t look, smell, or taste right. It was almost as if the water was brown and you could see the dirt in it. Most people thought it was sewage but it turn out to be iron. The Flint River is highly contaminated, 19 times more so than Lake Huron. The state Department of Environmental Quality wasn’t treating the river so, the water was building up iron which caused the water to turn brown. The water was worse than it seemed, half the service line to homes in Flint are made of lead because the water wasn’t treated like it was supposed to be. The lead got into the water and mixed with the iron. The fire stations are helping with providing free bottled water and water filters for the homes. The fire stations also gave out lead testing kits

It all started when Flint officials turned off the flow of already-treated Lake Huron water from the city of Detroit and started treating their own raw water from the Flint River instead. However, changing the source of the water was supposed to be a temporary solution, because the Genesee country, where

Of the 43 million people who use private water wells in the U.S., it is estimated that 20% of them are drinking from water sources with contaminants capable of harming human health. What is the end result? An insidious water system, only growing in its abilities to trigger a catastrophe. Flint provides us with a glimpse of what may be the new normal: thousands of children poisoned from lead-contaminated water, hundreds of thousands of citizens dependent on expensive bottled water, and a government that has refused to be accountable every step of the

Flint, Michigan is in a state of emergency, but help isn’t coming fast enough. The seepage of lead into drinking water pipes has created a widespread public health crisis, prompting President Obama to declare a federal state of emergency. The problem can be traced back to 2014 when the city started to use the Flint River as its water source. Flint needed an alternative water source until its connecting pipe to KWA was complete, so the city switched to the Flint River. In a summary of the Flint crisis, the New York Times stated, “the switch was made as a cost-saving measure for the struggling, majority-black city. Soon after, residents [began] to complain about the water’s color, taste and odor, and to report rashes and

Firstly, before the Flint water crisis, Flint was a bustling little town in Michigan, that is until General Motors closed up shop. Ever since, Flint faced hard times. Flint currently has more than 100,000 residents under the poverty line and the town was declared in a state of financial emergency which affected everything. Once a state of emergency is declared, the state, and sometimes city officials, have control of many crucial choices, including financial choices, which lead to the events of the water crisis. As the city of Flint had been building a new pipeline,

Flint River water is 19 times more corrosive than Lake Huron’s water. DWSD treats their water so that it is safe to drink. Flint did not treat their water with an anti-corrosive agent. MDEQ (Michigan Department of Environmental Quality) told Flint officials the anti-corrosive additive was not necessary. GM stopped using the Flint River water because it was corroding the car parts. The Flint River water was so corrosive that lead leached into people’s water (lead is a toxin that can cause brain damage to children and kidney failure in adults). Flint officials said that homes that have lead pipes were the only homes possible to have lead leached into them. Residents were told that the water was safe to drink and that it would be a waste of money to buy bottled water. Flint had been issued an emergency manager who had researchers test Flint’s water. The test’s showed positive for lead. With some home’s reporting up to 1,000-4,000 parts per billion. The state mandate for lead is 15 parts per billion. The state then issued that citizens water testing kits and water filters that had no effect at

According to documentary “poison water” by Nova “Since the late 1950s, G.M. closed seven major facilities in the region. Tens of thousands of jobs were lost. In 2011, with the city close to bankruptcy, Governor Rick Snyder stripped power from city officials and assigned a series of emergency managers to fix Flint's financial crisis. ” In order to save money, Michigan state took over Flint and started using it as their water source stating from April 2014.The switch from lake Huron to Flint river ended up being a awful to the residents. The flint water was not being treated inadequately. Even though the government of Michigan knew about this, they weren’t willing to do anything about it. Because of that, the residents were being affected in many ways. The residents started noticing that the water was starting to have an odor and changing colors. On top of that, they started noticing that the water was affecting their children's skins and that the water is thinning their hair.This is not the only way the residents are being affected. From the unmonitored excessive amount of led that is out in Flint's water, these people are exposed to possibly permanent lead poison and other health effects.These people can’t even move out because it's almost impossible to sell their houses in the arias that are affected by this water,and these residents are forced to stay and knowingly use the contaminated water.