Flint, Michigan's water.

[Happy_Lendervedder]

Amid denials, state workers in Flint got clean water:

A Jan. 7, 2015, notice from the state Department of Technology, Management and Budget, which oversees state office buildings, references a notice about a violation of drinking water standards that had recently been sent out by the City of Flint.

“While the City of Flint states that corrective actions are not necessary, DTMB is in the process of providing a water cooler on each occupied floor, positioned near the water fountain, so you can choose which water to drink,” said the notice.

“The coolers will arrive today and will be provided as long as the public water does not meet treatment requirements.”

State officials could not immediately answer e-mailed questions about the water purchases, including how long the state continued to buy bottled water for state employees in Flint while telling Flint residents the water was safe to drink. An official said the administration was “looking into these issues.”

[Happy_Lendervedder]

Filters being handed out to public not strong enough to filter the lead out.

What a fucking clusterfuck. Hope the governor’s newly hired PR team can figure out how to spin this one quick.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@davidm

Wow. I wonder what it would cost to replace 500 miles of pipes. I’d bet it’s much more than what they thought they were saving by switching to Flint River water.

It is my understanding that they were saving 5 million dollars over 2 years.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Bruce_Wayne

Water filters have been getting passed out.(Cite). Snyder doesn’t deserve all the blame for this, it just happened under his watch. The city has been mismanaged for years, that’s why there was an emergency manager appointed in the first place. Between convicted felons getting elected to city council and Eric Mays there isn’t a whole lot of confidence in local leadership.

With few exceptions, commercially available water filters are notoriously bad at filtering out heavy metals like lead. I would like to see Snyder feeding this filtered water to his grand kids before I would even consider feeding it to mine.

And its not a “it just happened on his watch” situation. He (and people he appointed) precipitated this problem. The convicted felons got elected after the Emergency manager was put in place and no one would run for the council because they had no power. No, it is entirely fair to lay blame at Snyder’s feet. I’m sure he would rather that this never happened but he was willing to play fast and loose with the lives and health of poor people in order to save a few bucks.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Bruce_Wayne

That’s hardly surprising. Bernie Sanders has something to say about Snyder as well. I feel like laying this all at the governor’s feet is simple.

Sometimes the can be assigned simply, even for horrible tragedies.

EVERYONE involved in the decisions that led up to this tragedy was Snyder or a Snyder Appointee (or one of their appointees).

Unless you want to blame the tragedy on the decline of the US auto industry in the rust belt or on the leadership of Flint or Detroit BEFORE the decision were made that caused this tragedy, I don’t see where else blame can be lain.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@septimus

Michael Moore is also displeased with Governor Snyder.

Yes, I know that many on this (“liberal” :smack: ) board will treat Moore’s position as a contrarian indicator, defaulting to Snyder’s side because Moore opposes him.

He got one thing right. Terrorists could only DREAM of pulling off something this destructive.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@elucidator

This talk about water filters? Can you filter something that is dissolved into the water? Wouldn’t the water have to be distilled to have any effect on the lead content? I can grasp how filtering might remove flakes and chunks of lead, but isn’t it the lead that is already merged with the water that is the problem?

What am I missing here?

There are some expensive water filters that can effectively filter out dissolved heavy metals. Most filters that advertise as removing heavy metals remove less than half the heavy metal content. I don’t know what kind of filters they are distributing but there aren’t a whole lot of really effective commercially available heavy water filters. if you’ve got a heavy water problem then you are probably on well water that is suddenly leaching heavy metals and that’s when you pony up to switch to municipal water or dig a new well. Treating heavy metals with filters is not a long term (or even medium term) solution.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Machine_Elf

Perhaps you’ve heard the expression “never attribute to malice that which can be attributed to incompetence.” I think that’s applicable in this case.

How about gross indifference followed up with a massive amount of ass covering over the results of that gross indifference.

socioeconomic status was probably a more important factor than race.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@davidm

i think in discussion of racism this aspect of the issue has been ignored or perhaps not noticed. Is there anything to the claim that this wasn’t done to save money, and that in fact detroit offered them a discount that would have saved them more than switching sources did?

what the fuckity fuck fuck!!!

Are you fucking kidding me???

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@davidm

i think in discussion of racism this aspect of the issue has been ignored or perhaps not noticed. Is there anything to the claim that this wasn’t done to save money, and that in fact detroit offered them a discount that would have saved them more than switching sources did?

what the fuckity fuck fuck!!!

Are you fucking kidding me???

Fuckityfuckityfuckfuckfuckfuck

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Happy_Lendervedder

And the reason the city council later voted 7-1 to return to Detroit’s water was because their residents were being poisoned. The reason the EM ignored their vote and called it “incomprehensible” was to save money.

This keeps getting more and more distressing. I’m going to put my head in the sand and pretend I don’t live in this world.

[davidm]

@Damuri_Ajashi

what the fuckity fuck fuck!!!

Are you fucking kidding me???

Fuckityfuckityfuckfuckfuckfuck

All I have is that article I linked to. I haven’t heard anything else about it so I have no idea if it’s accurate or not. If it was, you’d think that we would have heard more about it by now, but who knows?

[davidm]

Here’s an obvious, but un-discussed result of all of this.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/new-trouble-knocks-flint-as-mortgage-firms-require-proof-of-safe-water-1454544966

Flint, Mich., residents have a new concern on top of lead in their drinking water: Some mortgage lenders say home buyers must prove there is no contamination at a property or they won’t make a loan for its purchase.

Most of the article is behind a paywall, but there’s enough to make the point. I have to believe that buyers would also be very wary.

[Happy_Lendervedder]

@Damuri_Ajashi

This keeps getting more and more distressing. I’m going to put my head in the sand and pretend I don’t live in this world.

It’s very distressing. Flint is now back on Detroit’s water, they’ve begun treating it to coat the pipes, but yet the water is still so lead-poisoned the filters being installed are effectively useless.

And yet the governor continues to say that replacing the pipes (the ones that continue to poison the residents) isn’t on his agenda. But he is encouraging the good people of the world to help the people of Flint by donating to his 501c4 organization, Moving Michigan Forward.

Oh, and incidentally, Moving Michigan Forward is also paying for the high-priced public relations firms Snyder has hired since the news of Flint broke nationally. So he’s basically asking people for donations to help him spin this disaster.

[davidm]

A state attorney general’s office’s investigator says that manslaughter charges are possible.
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/manslaughter-charges-possible-in-flint-water-crisis-says-top-investigator/ar-BBpkVS2?ocid=spartanntp

As a probe begins into the water crisis gripping Flint, Mich., a top investigator announced Tuesday that if officials are found to have been grossly negligent they could face charges as serious as manslaughter.

“We’re here to investigate what possible crimes there are, anything [from] involuntary manslaughter or death that may have happened to some young person or old person because of this poisoning, to misconduct in office,” said Todd Flood, the special counsel for the state attorney general’s office who is in charge of the investigation. “We take this very seriously.”

[Happy_Lendervedder]

In the continuing saga of Gov. Rick Snyder (R) and his incompetent leadership, things we learned today:

[ul]
Snyder’s spokesman knew about the Legionnaire’s outbreak in Flint an entire year before anyone decided to inform the public.[/ul]
[ul]Snyder’s current chief of staff got an email about the Legionnaire’s outbreak 9 months before anyone decided to inform the public (although he now says he never opened that email. Maybe the subject line wasn’t clear.).[/ul]
[ul]Snyder’s environmental policy adviser and chief legal counsel both argued in 2014 for Flint to switch back to Detroit water.[/ul]
[ul]Snyder’s environmental policy adviser admitted that she left certain agencies out of her email communications, so her concerns about Flint water wouldn’t become public information through FOIA.[/ul]

Holy shitbags, Batman.

[davidm]

Six state employees are being criminally charged.

6 state employees criminally charged in Flint water crisis

FLINT — Six state employees were criminally charged this morning in district court in connection with the Flint water crisis.

Charged are Michigan Department of Health and Human Services workers Nancy Peeler, Corinne Miller and Robert Scott, and Michigan Department of Environmental Quality employees Liane Shekter-Smith; Adam Rosenthal and Patrick Cook, according to testimony this morning in Flint’s district court.

Investigator: Workers changed reports, hid data in Flint water crisis

FLINT — A special investigator for the Michigan Attorney General’s office said six state employees who were criminally charged today hid and manipulated data last summer that showed a change in drinking-water sources was poisoning people here.

[Boyo_Jim]

You mean 6 MORE state employees, for a total of nine.

The charges are damming, but what seems missing is motive. It’s difficult to believe that these civil servants, on their own initiative, did so much to cover up and falsify the dangerous test results. I suspect there is a higher up level of political leadership that directed this.

But there’s a good chance there’s no concrete evidence of it.

[davidm]

@Boyo_Jim

You mean 6 MORE state employees, for a total of nine.

The charges are damming, but what seems missing is motive. It’s difficult to believe that these civil servants, on their own initiative, did so much to cover up and falsify the dangerous test results. I suspect there is a higher up level of political leadership that directed this.

But there’s a good chance there’s no concrete evidence of it.

I’m sure that at least some of those charged would be more than willing to make a deal in exchange for testimony.

[Boyo_Jim]

I would have thought that some of them were already offered a deal of no prosecution at all if they could come up with real dirt on higher ups, and I suspect they couldn’t document anything.

I hope I’m wrong.