Sabertooth
Footballguy
Interesting. Hope his kids are not impacted by elevated lead levels. If he falsified reports though, I hope he feels the guilt. He should. That's terrible.
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Flint, Michigan lead poisoning in water supply (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter timschochet
- Start date
Snorkelson
Footballguy
He had the tests and his supervisors said “throw out these two samples, they aren’t valid” and they just happened to be the two highest samples. He questioned it at the time but just did what they said. I’ll post a link, he’s guilty but it sounds like he tried to do the right thing after the fact but no one was listening.
Here
Sabertooth
Footballguy
Snorkelson
Footballguy
Spent a week in glacier national park hiking with him back in the day. He’s an outdoors guy, lived in flint his whole life outside of college, needless to say I was surprised when that news broke.
Sand
Footballguy
Considering we know that lead poisoning had a significant role in the downfall of the Roman Empire I think we can safely aim for some pretty low lead levels for our drinking water.
Ilov80s
Footballguy
While Flint was especially bad, the reality this a problem across the country that is very often not being addressed.
Kids in Tampa, be careful at that school drinking fountain
Or in Maryland
We haven't done well with infrastructure
Kids in Tampa, be careful at that school drinking fountain
Or in Maryland
We haven't done well with infrastructure
timschochet
Footballguy
This is true but I don’t think it should be used as an argument to minimize what happened in Flint, as jon mx attempted to do earlier in the thread solely because he perceived it as an attack on Republicans.
Ilov80s
Footballguy
No, the Flint thing was a disaster. I am just saying that people should take a closer look at their own situation as well. The country should have immediatley paid to fix the Flint issue and should be putting up money to help test and update all of our water supplies.
Dinsy Ejotuz
Footballguy
Former head of Michigan DHS to stand trial for felony involuntary manslaughter.
Rove!
Footballguy
Such a cautionary tale not to cave in when pressured to commit an unethical act. Once you cross that ethical line, the damage may be difficult to contain and it could spiral out of control.
Ilov80s
Footballguy
It’s so easy to do something wrong when you just view yourself as part of the chain. That’s how so many of the worst atrocities in human history have come about.
Ilov80s
Footballguy
I don't know much about the City Council and it sounds like their raises are small, but the mayor was not the mayor when water was poisoned. She was elected after that and has spearheaded the attempts to fix the problem.
Max Power
Footballguy
Not going to hate, but it is hard to agree that Flint's issues are moving in the right direction with competant leaders at the moment. Do they need a bailout?
Ilov80s
Footballguy
I'm not saying she deserved a raise either. It was recommended by some outside firm and the council put forward a motion to stop it but some guy basically filibustered it. Very very weird. Flint has been in economic disarray for years and years- long before the water issue. The reason for the water crisis was Flint was in a financial emergency and so the Governor appointed an emergency manager to take over the city and run above the elected officials. To save money he switched water sources to a new cheaper option but that option wasn't going to be ready in time so they began treating water out of the Flint River as a temporary source. That was the source of all the issues. So a big reason the city feels especially angry is the decision was made by outside forces from the State put in charge of the city over their locally elected leaders and it was all an attempt to save like $5 million and its going to cost way way way more than that. Also, they had to end up spending roughly $5 million anyway to just get the temporary Flint River water source running. It was total incompetence by the emergency management team from the State.
The State just released the $77 million loan/grant for water infrastructure yesterday. This was part of a larger package approved a while ago.
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Da Guru
Fair & Balanced
Have you ever been to Flint? They need anything and everything. GM leaving devastated the whole town.
Max Power
Footballguy
I've seen semi pro.
On a serious note, I know they are in good hands. Raises to city council and Obama drank the water.
Max Power
Footballguy
IL80s, you're a good poster here. You bring facts and reason to the table. I Started here with the hope of talking to people like you and over the years I've devolved into a soundbite junkie.
Thank you for the reply and keep up the good work.
Why must you put BS motivation in what you say. Unless you are a damn mind-reader, you should not just make up some bullcrap and ASSUME some evil intentions. This is the kind of crap which needs to stop. I could have cared less if he was a Republican. May motivation was the lynch mob which Rachel Maddows was trying to stir up prior to having any facts what so ever and do the same BS you are doing by projecting some kind of evil motivations. Just ASSUME crap against people you dislike/disagree with. It is a lame and ignorant tactic. Of course you will blow this off as 'whining' instead of admitting what a piece a crap your post was.
squistion
Footballguy
Turns out she was right and was given an Emmy for her Flint coverage.
News & Doc EmmysVerified account @newsemmys 5 Oct 2017
The Emmy for Outstanding News Discussion & Analysis goes to @Maddow "An American Disaster: The Crisis in Flint." #NewsEmmys
https://twitter.com/newsemmys/status/916104419548246017
Max Power
Footballguy
She was right to raise the issue, but she was wrong in much of what she said. Read through this thread, and there were a lot of extreme stuff thrown at the governor which were wrong. Maddow's had Snyder convicted early on.
squistion
Footballguy
She is reporter, journalist, commentator and has no authority or ability to fix any problem. She was pretty much the first one in the media with a national audience to spotlight that the drinking water had been poisoned.
Max Power
Footballguy
Snyder served out his two terms in office. Snyder has not been charged with anything. The situation turned out to be a lot more complex than a Republican governor trying to save a few pennies and did not care about the black children. There were massive mistakes at the local level, there were potentially criminal actions done by regular state employees, there courts orders which aided in causing this crisis, there were actions at the local board level approving the switch, there were actions by the governor appointed manager which added to the problems, there were mistakes at the EPA level. I will stand by every quote in this thread. There was a lot more stuff going on here than simply a cheapass governor who did not care.
Da Guru
Fair & Balanced
It is ironic that after Flint they started testing the water everywhere in Michigan. At least 22 other Michigan communities had an even worse tainted water problem than Flint, according to recent data from the Michigan Dept. of Health & Human Services (DHHS). Many of Michigan’s community water systems, including Flint’s, were built 50-100 years ago and need piping upgrades.
Most of these areas with worse water than Flint are rural areas that politicians in Washington don`t care about though. Flint is a much better story.
And that is the problem. We have hundreds/thousands of communities which have bad water. We have thousands of bridges which need repaired. We have climate change to deal with. There are going to be problems which rise up beacause the problems as so extensive we can not deal with all of them. We have to make decisions on which problems to tackle. This hindsight stuff of pointing fingers at your political enemies does no good and is not fair. There were people of all kinds who had their hands in this.
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squistion
Footballguy
No, but...
https://www.mlive.com/news/flint/2018/02/um_report_gov_snyder_bears_sig.html
UM report: Gov. Snyder bears 'significant legal responsibility' for Flint water crisis
FLINT, MI -- Gov. Rick Snyder "bears significant legal responsibility for the (Flint water) crisis based on his supervisory role over state agencies," a new report from the University of Michigan School of Public Health and others says.
The report -- "Learning from the Flint Water Crisis: Protecting the Public's Health During a Financial Emergency" -- also concludes the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality had the legal power to have prevented the crisis but failed to do so and that local government's ability to respond was crippled by the state's emergency manager law.
[...]
In discussing Snyder's role in the emergency, the report notes conflicting accounts about when the governor became aware of water quality problems or outbreaks of Legionnaires' disease.
"But reports, interviews, and released emails suggest that by October 2014, the governor's staff was sufficiently aware ... that several top aides were arguing that Flint should return to using water from (the city of Detroit)," the report says.
"The governor had adequate legal authority to intervene -- by demanding more information from agency directors, reorganizing agencies to assure the availability of appropriate expertise where needed, ordering state agencies to respond, or ultimately, firing ineffective agency heads -- but he abjured, either due to ignorance or willful neglect of duty.
"Flint residents' complaints were not hidden from the governor, and he had a responsibility to listen and respond," the 80-page report says.
Snyder failed to demand the MDEQ or the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services conduct further investigation or take action in Flint, failed to take residents' complaints seriously by investigating or responding in a timely way, failed to take responsibility for the performance of department heads he appointed, and failed to declare an emergency in Flint after learning the extent of the crisis, according to the report.
[...]
Nothing you cut and pasted changes anything. My statements and assessment proved to be more accurate than many of the posters here and Maddow who wanted Snyder's head on a stick. I never claimed Snyder does not bear significant blame.
squistion
Footballguy
That is a matter of opinion and people can review the thread and decide for themselves who was or was not accurate.
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Da Guru
Fair & Balanced
Ilov80s
Footballguy
I mean everyone posting here was right and wrong at varying points. I don’t think that’s nearly as important as fixing the problem and upgrading infrastructure across the country. I thought the President might make that a priority but it seems that was just BS. Someone has to do something here.
Rove!
Footballguy
She pretty much stopped talking about it as soon as it came out that the EPA knew about the problem for months without saying or doing anything other than encouraging state officials to stifle the whistleblowers...
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Snorkelson
Footballguy
Flint water crisis, somehow Rachel Maddow is the bad guy at the end of it all. 
bravo.
bravo.Where did anyone say she was the bad guy? She brought light to an important issue. But she was still a partisan hack who twisted the story to her narrative that the Republican governor was a crook. She spent more time trying to prove her whacky conspiracy theories than she did trying to help the situation.Flint water crisis, somehow Rachel Maddow is the bad guy at the end of it all.
squistion
Footballguy
Yeah, you can't make this stuff up.Flint water crisis, somehow Rachel Maddow is the bad guy at the end of it all.
squistion
Footballguy
Authorities investigating Flint's water crisis have used search warrants to seize from storage the state-owned mobile devices of former Gov. Rick Snyder and 65 other current or former officials, The Associated Press has learned.
https://apnews.com/8fae0d11e68d40ae8a294cd9fd9e2ecf?utm_source=Twitter&utm_campaign=SocialFlow&utm_medium=APCentralRegion
zoonation
Footballguy
SaintsInDome2006
Footballguy
Da Guru
Fair & Balanced
22 counties in Michigan have worse water than Flint. Lets get all of them on board. Why does Flint get all the press when many others have the same problem and some worse. Lets fix all of this.
The embattled city of Flint has received nearly half a billion dollars in federal and state aid over the past two years to replace its aging water pipelines and make restitution for any damage that may have been done to its citizenry by lead-contaminated H2O.
But at least 22 other Michigan communities have an even worse tainted water problem than Flint, according to recent data from the Michigan Dept. of Health & Human Services (DHHS). How are they going to pay to fix it?
Gov. Rick Snyder’s 21st Century Infrastructure Commission released a report at the end of last year that argued that Michigan must close a $60 billion gap over the next two decades in order to achieve a modern infrastructure system. Investing in Michigan’s aging water systems, the report contends, is an investment in public health. Many of Michigan’s community water systems, including Flint’s, were built 50-100 years ago.
A survey by Reuters news agency found late last year that there are some 3,000 areas throughout the country with water quality worse than Flint’s. In Michigan, state Dept. of Environmental Quality (DEQ) records show that six private water supplies in Michigan and two municipalities — not including Flint — meet or exceed the federal limit on lead and copper in water tested at the customer tap. Another six private and 16 municipal systems across the state, ranging in size from 25 customers to more than 120,000, tested for levels that are below the federal limit but above safety benchmarks used by the World Health Organization (WHO) and by Virginia Tech researchers. Michigan cities with lead at or above the WHO benchmark include Kalamazoo (the second-largest water supply system in the state), Muskegon Heights, Benton Harbor, Owosso, Ionia, Marysville and St. Louis in Gratiot Counrty.
None of these communities has the financial capability to launch a renovation effort comparable to what Flint is now able to utilize using state and federal tax dollars.
Flint Mayor Karen Weaver’s “Operation Fast Start,” which has taken more than a year to get off the ground, claims to have replaced water service lines in more than 3,000 domiciles out of at least 20,000 homes and businesses that “Fast Start” hopes to repair by the year 2020.
What “Fast Start” engineers and contractors have found so far is what many Flint residents already knew — that the “poisoning” of Flint residents that took place on a citywide basis over the past three years never happened.
That’s because many if not most of the service lines to private residences were already “coppered out,” i.e. they already had copper (not galvanized lead) service lines from their interior taps all the way out to the street on which they were situated. No replacement action was necessary.
For example, on one street in zip code 48503 — by every account the Flint area with the highest Elevated Blood Lead Levels (EBLLs) — two-thirds of the homes were found just last week to be “coppered out.” Only a third needed any repairs at all, and except for a single home, those were only partial. On this street, homeowners have been able to drink water straight from the tap without filters for the past three years. Both the quality of their water and the EBLLs of the occupants have passed every safety test.
But the squeaky wheel always gets the grease. All this work — necessary and unnecessary — is being paid for by state and federal taxpayers (make it as fungible as possible, please!). This is thanks to Mayor Weaver’s relentless rattling of the “tin cup,” reinforced by cries of outrage from local politicians that Flint has been devastated by a series of penny-pinching, arrogant, and incompetent state-appointed emergency managers and other public officials. It hasn’t helped that the city’s virtually useless record-keeping over the years has made it impossible for anyone to determine where work was needed and where it was not.
Fact is, even during the height of the Flint “water crisis,” there has been ample evidence that Flint’s overall water quality was at least as good — and in many cases, better — than a surprising number of other Michigan communities.
The latest evidence comes from the Michigan Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program, a division of the state DHHS, which lists the percentages of children tested for lead with blood lead levels over 5 ug/dL (“Elevated Blood Lead Levels” or “EBLLs”) in each Michigan zip code.
The embattled city of Flint has received nearly half a billion dollars in federal and state aid over the past two years to replace its aging water pipelines and make restitution for any damage that may have been done to its citizenry by lead-contaminated H2O.
But at least 22 other Michigan communities have an even worse tainted water problem than Flint, according to recent data from the Michigan Dept. of Health & Human Services (DHHS). How are they going to pay to fix it?
Gov. Rick Snyder’s 21st Century Infrastructure Commission released a report at the end of last year that argued that Michigan must close a $60 billion gap over the next two decades in order to achieve a modern infrastructure system. Investing in Michigan’s aging water systems, the report contends, is an investment in public health. Many of Michigan’s community water systems, including Flint’s, were built 50-100 years ago.
A survey by Reuters news agency found late last year that there are some 3,000 areas throughout the country with water quality worse than Flint’s. In Michigan, state Dept. of Environmental Quality (DEQ) records show that six private water supplies in Michigan and two municipalities — not including Flint — meet or exceed the federal limit on lead and copper in water tested at the customer tap. Another six private and 16 municipal systems across the state, ranging in size from 25 customers to more than 120,000, tested for levels that are below the federal limit but above safety benchmarks used by the World Health Organization (WHO) and by Virginia Tech researchers. Michigan cities with lead at or above the WHO benchmark include Kalamazoo (the second-largest water supply system in the state), Muskegon Heights, Benton Harbor, Owosso, Ionia, Marysville and St. Louis in Gratiot Counrty.
None of these communities has the financial capability to launch a renovation effort comparable to what Flint is now able to utilize using state and federal tax dollars.
Flint Mayor Karen Weaver’s “Operation Fast Start,” which has taken more than a year to get off the ground, claims to have replaced water service lines in more than 3,000 domiciles out of at least 20,000 homes and businesses that “Fast Start” hopes to repair by the year 2020.
What “Fast Start” engineers and contractors have found so far is what many Flint residents already knew — that the “poisoning” of Flint residents that took place on a citywide basis over the past three years never happened.
That’s because many if not most of the service lines to private residences were already “coppered out,” i.e. they already had copper (not galvanized lead) service lines from their interior taps all the way out to the street on which they were situated. No replacement action was necessary.
For example, on one street in zip code 48503 — by every account the Flint area with the highest Elevated Blood Lead Levels (EBLLs) — two-thirds of the homes were found just last week to be “coppered out.” Only a third needed any repairs at all, and except for a single home, those were only partial. On this street, homeowners have been able to drink water straight from the tap without filters for the past three years. Both the quality of their water and the EBLLs of the occupants have passed every safety test.
But the squeaky wheel always gets the grease. All this work — necessary and unnecessary — is being paid for by state and federal taxpayers (make it as fungible as possible, please!). This is thanks to Mayor Weaver’s relentless rattling of the “tin cup,” reinforced by cries of outrage from local politicians that Flint has been devastated by a series of penny-pinching, arrogant, and incompetent state-appointed emergency managers and other public officials. It hasn’t helped that the city’s virtually useless record-keeping over the years has made it impossible for anyone to determine where work was needed and where it was not.
Fact is, even during the height of the Flint “water crisis,” there has been ample evidence that Flint’s overall water quality was at least as good — and in many cases, better — than a surprising number of other Michigan communities.
The latest evidence comes from the Michigan Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program, a division of the state DHHS, which lists the percentages of children tested for lead with blood lead levels over 5 ug/dL (“Elevated Blood Lead Levels” or “EBLLs”) in each Michigan zip code.
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