The big news yesterday arose from MI Gov. Rick Snyder’s “apology” to the residents of Flint, along with his announcement of the resignation of Dan Wyant, the head of the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality.
“I want the Flint community to know how very sorry I am that this has happened," Snyder said. "And I want all Michigan citizens to know that we will learn from this experience, because Flint is not the only city that has an aging infrastructure."
It was Wyant who responded so cavalierly to the dangers presented by the lack of corrosion control measures when Flint switched to using the Flint River as its water source, and Wyant who dismissed concerns of residents—and even his own employees—when they insisted that there were serious dangers in the water. For what it’s worth, the MDEQ public information officer, Brad Wurfel, has also resigned.
Wyant’s resignation has seemed likely for some time, but yesterday’s publication of a letter composed by the Flint Water Advisory Task Force, a small group of environmental and public health experts assembled by Snyder in October and “charged with reviewing actions regarding water use and testing in Flint and offer recommendations for future guidelines to protect the health and safety of all state residents.” (See below for more information about the task force members.)
The following paragraphs are taken from that letter, via extracts published in this MLive report from today. The letter itself is worth reading in its entirety here. They do not mince words.
The MDEQ failed in three fundamental ways.
Regulatory failure.
We believe in the Office of Drinking Water and Municipal Assistance (ODWMA) at MDEQ, a culture exists in which 'technical compliance' is considered sufficient to ensure safe drinking water in Michigan. This minimalist approach to regulatory and oversight responsibility is unacceptable and simply insufficient to the task of public protection. It led to the MDEQ's failure to recognize a number of indications that switching the water source in Flint would -- and did -- compromise both water safety and water quality. The MDEQ made a number of decisions that were, and continue to be, justified on the basis that federal rules 'allowed' those decisions to be made. ODWMA must adopt a posture that is driven not by this minimalist technical compliance approach, but rather by one that is founded on what needs to be done to assure drinking water safety."…Failure in substance and tone of MDEQ response to the public
"Throughout 2015, as the public raised concerns and as independent studies and testing were conducted and brought to the attention of MDEQ, the agency's response was often one of aggressive dismissal, belittlement, and attempts to discredit these efforts and the individuals involved. We find both the tone and substance of many MDEQ public statements to be completely unacceptable. In a real way, the MDEQ represents the public, including the very individuals it treated dismissively and disrespectfully in public statements. We recognize that the agency might disagree with the opinions of others on a variety of issues, including testing protocol, interpretation of testing results, the requirements of federal law and rules, other matters. What is disturbing about MDEQ's responses, however, is their persistent tone of scorn and derision. In fact, the MDEQ seems to have been more determined to discredit the work of others -- who ultimately proved to be right -- than to pursue its own oversight responsibility."...
Failure in MDEQ interpretation of the lead and copper rule
The federal Lead and Copper Rule (LCR) is central to what happened in Flint, because that rule, at least theoretically, is designed to prevent lead and copper contamination of drinking water. The federal LCR calls for 'optimized corrosion control treatment,' which the MDEQ did not require in the switch to the Flint River. Prior to the switch, MDEQ staff instructed city of Flint water treatment staff that corrosion control treatment (CCT) was not necessary until two six-month monitoring periods had been conducted. The need for CCT would be evaluated after the results from those two monitoring periods were reviewed. The decision not to require CCT, made at the direction of the MDEQ, led directly to the contamination of the Flint water system.
In their concluding paragraph, they state: “The Flint water crisis never should have happened.” And they call for sustained action on the part of the state government to remedy its effects.
It is important to know the constituencies and alliances represented on this task force. From the press release announcing the task force:
Task force members include experts in public health and medicine, water management, and environmental protection from both sides of the aisle, and will be co-chaired by Ken Sikkema of Public Sector Consultants and Chris Kolb, of the Michigan Environmental Council. [Both Sikkema and Kolb have served in public office, the former (R-Grand Rapids) in both houses and the latter (D-Ann Arbor) in the MI House.] Also serving will be Dr. Matthew Davis of the University of Michigan Health System, Eric Rothstein, of the Galardi Rothstein Group and Dr. Lawrence Reynolds of Mott Children’s Health Center in Flint.
So, not a whitewash, and not a continuation of the effort to minimize the damage that was caused through deliberate actions and omissions. Sikkema is a very high-profile Republican, and if he was part of this investigation, that’s a good sign of at least some willingness to continue to assign responsibility for the disaster. Or so I hope.
For it was Snyder who was ultimately the boss of the MDEQ director. Both Wyant and the Emergency Manager in charge of Flint, Darnell Earley, were accountable to Snyder and to no one else.
As Lonnie Scott, executive director of Progress Michigan, stated in a press release yesterday:
So far under Gov. Rick Snyder’s watch, there has been zero accountability in this crisis and that continues today.... Dan Wyant gets to walk away from this crisis, but the people of Flint do not. There’s a lot we don’t know about this man-made catastrophe. What did Gov. Snyder know and when did he know it? We need complete transparency so that justice for the families of Flint can be realized and the proper people can be held accountable. All documentation related this this crisis needs to be released to the public immediately. (emphasis added)
We need to keep the pressure on.
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