Photo/Pam Broviak
CHICAGO — According to the City of Chicago Finance Department, water cost per 1,000 gallons has gone up 323% from 2002 to 2017. Almost 16,000 Chicago children tested under six years old had lead poisoning in 2016. A 2015 Chicago Tribune article reported more than a fifth of the city’s census tracts, almost all African American and Latino, had lead poisoning rates higher in 2013 than it was five years earlier and twice the national average. A 2015 research article stated 13% of reading failure and 14.8% of math failure in Chicago school children can be attributed to exposure to elevated blood lead levels.
Yet, Chicago’s Mayor Rahm Emanuel stands alone in the U.S. in refusing to replace any water lead service lines while the city replaces hundreds of miles of water mains. Madison, WI became the first major city to replace all lead service lines, followed by Lansing, MI. Now most major cities are replacing lead service lines, requiring it when new water mains are replaced. New York just gave $20 million in grants to replace lead service pipes. Philadelphia, Denver, Pittsburgh, St. Paul and other cities all pay for the city’s part of the lead service line that runs from the water main in the street to the homeowner’s property. They have grants, interest free and low interest loans to pay for the property owner’s part of the lead service line. Only Chicago requires the homeowner pay the entire cost: both under the city street, from the water main and on our property to our homes.
Chicago was the last city in the US to stop the use of water lead service lines, only because the Federal government required it in 1986. It’s more than 300,000 lead service lines are more than any other US city. New York, Boston and other cities stopped using lead service lines decades before.
We know that replacing the water mains disturbs the lead and increases lead in water at that tap in our kitchens or bathroom. The phosphate compounds cities use to bind the lead in the service line cannot stop the disturbed line from increasing lead in the water that enters our homes. Lead is an absolute neurotoxin: there is no safe level and even tiny amounts effect the brain, nervous system and other organs. It can kill both children and adults. It hurts our children’s ability to learn and by the time they get to school they are often behind. Most cases of childhood lead poisoning are caused by lead paint, but lead in water is a factor and sometimes, the main cause.
When Amazon visited Chicago three weeks ago, Mayor Emanuel touted Chicago as a global city. It’s time for us to Unite and Demand that Mayor 1% move into the 21st century and use corporate taxes and our water money to replace all lead service lines now.
I always thought Chicago would screw up the water supply by polluting Lake Michigan. They almost did in the 1800s until in 1900 they reversed the Chicago River and screwed up the rivers to the west and south. Every time it rains big they almost screw up the lake with combined sewage and storm water overflows that get dumped in the lake. The Surfrider Foundation is suing US Steel over continued toxic hexavalent chromium dumping into the lake, a suit Chicago tagged onto. Turns out Rahm is screwing up the water supply at the other end of the supply system.
At the entrance way to potentially every house built with lead pipe water supply service lines we are getting serviced by Rahm, and here’s how. He has a “fix the leaky water main program” that is causing a “my kids are drinking lead, a known neurotoxin, from the kitchen sink problem.” Says the Chicago Tribune, 7 of 10 homes tested for lead in the water have lead in the water!
So what is Rahm doing about it? *He is playing politics with people’s lives. Will he stop his program long enough to find a solution? No. He refused. Other cities have. Will he get federal grant money to replace lead pipes? No. He refused. Other cities have. This is not Flint, Michigan. This problem is 27 times larger than Flint. Rahm has found a way to take the world’s largest fresh water supply on the planet and turn it into a nightmare.
It is an easy 3-step fix: 1) stop replacing the water mains that are causing lead contamination of our water supply, 2) secure the funds to replace lead service lines to people’s homes, 3) replace lead service lines immediately before replacing the leaky water mains. Then, hold Rahm accountable for the damage he has done to Chicago’s water supply up to this point in time, and bench him.
If the man can’t take 3 simple steps to save the people from this preventable health crisis then we must show him the door. He doesn’t deserve to be in the big leagues. Get the lead out. We can’t wait ‘till next year.
*Source: for the politics line… http://www.latimes.com/ct-met-chicago-city-council-roundup-lead-20180418-story.html