Introductory note: The notorious Nestlé company is in the throes of a public relations nightmare due to the permit the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality gave them to draw 400 gallons of water per minute from Evart, Michigan, for $200 annually. Scrambling for damage control, they are now donating pallets of water to the city of Flint, contradicting the same MDEQ analysis that the water is now safe, and shutting down bottled water distribution centers. How ironic! We will continue to resist the privatization and theft of our water resources in the name of profits! Below is a statement from Water is Life Alliance.
The State of Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) has just told the 80,000 citizens who opposed the Nestlé water grab in the small town of Evart that they don’t matter. They have determined it is legal to give even more of the water of the commons to Nestlé for free while the people of Flint and Detroit pay some of the highest water bills in the country. They also chose to grant this permit at the same time that massive new shut-offs are being carried out in Flint and Detroit in the coming month. Thousands more will be without water.
MDEQ claims it is only following the requirements of law, namely the Safe Drinking Water Act. But this law does not allow a permit without taking into account the impact on the people who are affected by it, or on the ecosystem that is its source. It does not allow the MDEQ to consider only the last incremental increase, but requires the impact of the entire withdrawal of 400 gallons per minute be reviewed.
Therefore we the people demand that the permit be withdrawn. We demand that the people impacted, which is all of us, must be consulted. We demand that the needs of the people for clean, affordable water must be met statewide before the needs of a private corporation for profit are honored. We require that anyone claiming to serve the people in public office or agency must pledge to truly do just that. This means that laws must be passed and enforced that guarantee people the right to water. When the public trust was embedded in the constitution of Michigan it did not define international corporate water profiteers as the public.
Call and write to the director of the MDEQ and challenge this permit on legal and moral grounds. Remind her that we do matter and will not go away.
We stood with the people of Flint on April 25 as they gathered in Lansing to shine a light on the continued injustices of pollution, lack of democracy, and access to affordable water after four years of promises.
Demand that the MDEQ require that all monitoring of withdrawal permits be done by an independent agency that has no ties with Nestle.
Demand that the precedent established by the court in the Mecosta case of 2009 be followed for any cumulative withdrawal of 400 gpm.
Insist that politicians who are expecting your vote pledge they will write and pass laws that no longer allow corporations to take free water from the state and sell it back to those who need it the most for a profit.
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