The Water War

In 2013, Flint's City Council voted 7-1 to pass a resolution allowing the city to stop purchasing treated water from Detroit and to switch to a new system under the Karegnondi Water Authority (KWA) that would draw water from over 150 miles away at Lake Huron, the project would take about 30 months to complete. Exactly one day after the city of Flint voted to stop purchasing water from Detroit, the city of Detroit gave Flint notice that they would no longer be selling them water, over a year before the KWA pipeline could be completed.

In a scramble to find a source of water for its citizens after Detroit canceled a near-50-year-old water supply contract, the city of Flint spent $4 million dollars on upgrades to their water treatment facilities so they could begin drawing and treating water from the Flint River.

The Problems Begin

April 25, 2014, was the day the water problems began for the citizens of Flint, the city officially stopped receiving water from Detroit when Flint mayor Dayne Walling turned off the Detroit water supply and turned on the supply from the Flint River.

Although the treated Flint River water met all quality standard testing many of the citizens of Flint begin to complain about the foul smell and color of the water coming from their faucets. Despite many complaints city officials continued to tell the citizens that their water was safe to use.

By Sep. 17, 2014 -- nearly six months after the city began using water from the Flint River city officials had issued three boil water advisories in 22 days and water samples tested positive for total coliform bacteria, which are unlikely to cause illness but can indicate that other disease-causing pathogens can be present in the water as well.

The boil water advisories shed light on a larger water issue for Flint-- water distribution. Hundreds of miles of water mains--many of which are over 70 years old which were hinted to be the source of potential contamination. On January 2, 2015 the citizens of Flint were notified that the city was violating the Safe Drinking Water Act for the level of trihalomethanes in the water and city officials began to call for Flint to begin using water from Detroit again.

Fear and outrage rose again when scientists from Virginia Tech claimed that hard water from the Flint River was highly corrosive to the water pipes in Flint and was leaching lead into the water supply, these claims were pushed further when children in Flint, Mich. were found to have elevated levels of lead in their bloodstream.

Genesse County has currently declared a public health emergency and is urging it’s citizens to not drink water from the town’s water supply as they attempt to reconnect to Detroit’s water supply.