The roots of the Flint water crisis can be traced all the way back to early 2013, when the city council approved a plan to switch the city’s water supply from Detroit to a system still under construction in order to save money.
This meant finding an interim water supply while the system was being completed, so they put the city’s water plant back into operation as a stop-gap. The city switched to Flint river water on April 25, 2014 and issued statement that the water was safe to drink.
However, over the next several months, three separate advisories were issued – one for e coli, one for coliform bacteria and one for trihalomethane, a byproduct of disinfectants. State and federal agencies started looking into the issues, but they weren’t always working together toward same goal, and throughout the months they spent investigating, the water remained in the same condition. Then in September 2015, an independent study indicated corrosiveness was causing lead to leach into citizens’ water.
The city issued a lead advisory and gave recommendations for safe use, but also maintained that the water was safe according to federal standards. A public health emergency was declared a week later. Now it’s national news and most people are aware of what’s been going on in Flint over the last several months.
