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Community Corner

WATER, WATER EVERYWHERE, BUT NOT A DROP TO DRINK!

 

The water problems of Detroit is NOT just a Detroit problem. According to the Detroit News,  metro Detroit suburbanites will pay much more than they expected for water and sewage services with most communities planning double-digit hikes for the next several years to pay for improvements to the aging water and sewer system, which serves 126 municipalities from Monroe County to Flint.  Average rates are going up 12.5% with communities like Eastpointe going up 30%, New Baltimore, 24%, Grosse Ile Township,  17%, and Taylor, 15%..

Approximately 5,000 Detroit residents and allies from across the country marched  in protest of the water shutoffs and prices from the Cobo Convention Center to Hart Plaza near the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department this past Friday.

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According to three U.N. experts  that the shutoffs could constitute a violation of the human right to water.

"Disconnections due to non-payment are only permissible if it can be shown that the resident is able to pay but is not paying,”  Human right to water and sanitation expert Catarina de Albuquerque said in a statement issued from the United Nations in Geneva.  In other words, when there is genuine inability to pay, human rights simply forbids disconnections."

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Atty. Jerome Goldberg, also stated about the Detroit water problem:

“In 2011, there were bonds floated in total of a billion dollars to fix the infrastructure ,but $537 million went instead to pay off interest rate swaps to JP Morgan Chase, UBS, Morgan Stanley and (other financial institutions),” Goldberg said. “The banks were rewarded. More than half of the money for infrastructure went to banks. (Now) we’re talking about raising rates on Detroiters and going through with tens of thousands of shut offs.”

Cicely McClellan  also says emergency management is the cause of the shutoffs, and states “ there are two sets of laws operating in Detroit.  They are disproportionately cutting off citizens, the low income, the elderly, children, who need the water and allowing large corporations not to pay their water bills. It’s a sin,”

The aging and neglected water and sewers have caused torrents of water spew ing from broken pipes in Detroit's Crosman School, flooding down stairs before warping tiles. No one even knows how long this flooding has been taking place since the school was closed in 2007.  It's not the only empty structure where city water steadily fills basements, floods streets, or runs into the gutter, wasting money and creating safety hazards.  There are thousands upon thousands of vacant buildings and no one even knows how many of these are leaking in the darkness as the water department claims to not have enough workers to check every structure.  This steady waste of water can be seen from the frozen photos taken this past winter in the slideshow and if something isn’t done, it will continue throughout the summer and into next winter and beyond.

Too often for those of us who live in Wyandotte, we take our lower bills for granted because we have our own water department, while the majority of our neighboring communities are being hit hard with rising costs in a poor economy and shortage of jobs, and are at the mercy of politicians, and big business.

NOW is the time to take a stand to help our neighbors by contacting the Detroit Water Brigade to help with donations, or to volunteer our services.  Call, e-mail or write to your local and state representatives – make your voice heard.  It is a sad commentary to see people taking empty buckets to fill from garden hoses from the homes of people with water so they can simply have something to drink or to bathe themselves.

Detroit Water Brigade (844) 42-WATER or go to:  http://detroitwaterbrigade.org.






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