Residents of the impoverished City of Flint pay some of the highest water bills in MI.
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We’ve heard stories of many Metro-Detroiters loading their cars with bottled water and driving to Flint.
At this point in the Flint water crisis, the state has little credibility when it provides advice on risks of lead in water. Flint saw four separate emergency managers between December 2011 and April 2015; the switch to Flint River water from the Detroit water system was made under one of them as a money-saving move.
Last week, Snyder declared an emergency after Flint and Genesee County requested financial assistance.
Volunteers and police are knocking on doors in Flint to distribute bottled water, filters and lead test kits to residents in the MI city that’s confronting a water crisis.
Gov. Rick Snyder has asked the Federal Emergency Management Agency for help in coordinating a plan aimed at solving Flint’s water crisis.
Governor Snyder says residents should use filters and bottled water until Flint’s switch back to Detroit’s water is assessed.
Guard troops will relieve American Red Cross volunteers who have been staffing distribution centers that have been handing out bottled water, filters, and testing kits to help address the lead contamination crisis. This caused lead leaching from pipes and fixtures into the water, according to the Free Press.
The News reports that the state Department of Health and Human Services had published a picture of a poster on its website with the words “Hey Flint!”
Former Mayor Dayne Walling was quoted at the time of the vote as saying the city planned to keep getting its drinking water from Detroit until the new pipeline was built.
The administration is “obviously very concerned about it, but I don’t have any news to make with you on that today”, McDonough said. “The state will be working hard to partner with the city on additional resources” for community and economic development and early childhood education, he said.
Asked if she would bathe her own child in Flint water, Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha said she would feel comfortable bathing an older child, but would take extra precautions with an infant. “I think we’re trying to be proactive in a partnership context”.
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U.S. Rep. Dan Kildee, a Democrat who represents the Flint area, said: “It is the state’s ultimate responsibility to act and make it right”.
