The Handbook seeks to empower Michigan residents to be effective watchdogs of their own water systems regarding the control of lead in public water systems. It provides over 20 sample Freedom of Information Act Requests and over 30 watchdog actions.
In Historic Complaint, Residents & Environmental Justice Advocates Demand Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy Address Discriminatory Siting of Hazardous Waste Facilities
What does it mean to live near a hazardous waste facility? Many residents of Detroit and Hamtramck know the answer all too well. From being nauseated and suffering a loss of appetite due to fumes and odors, to high levels of dust particles aggravating asthma and denying families the ability to open their windows to enjoy fresh air, the impacts are real and severe.
Worse is the unequal distribution of the risks inherent to hazardous waste arriving at facilities in Michigan every year. In its 2007 follow up to the seminal “Race and Toxic Waste,” researchers found Michigan to have the most egregiously disproportionate toxic waste burden in the nation.
Little has changed since. In 2017 316,548 tons of hazardous waste was received by Michigan’s eight hazardous waste facilities accepting offsite hazardous waste. While only 25% of the statewide population, minorities make up 65% of the communities residing within 3 miles of one of the eight facilities. Seven of eight are licensed in a location where the percentage of minorities within a three-mile radius is at or above the statewide average.
In effect, the continued siting of hazardous waste facilities among communities of color has labeled their neighborhoods as sacrificial zones, bearing the burden of society’s collective generation of hazardous waste.
The most recent siting decision highlights the ever-mounting threats to the health and justice of Michigan’s communities of color. The U.S. Ecology North facility is situated in Detroit near the city’s border to southeast Hamtramck. 80% of residents within a 3-mile radius are minorities, the highest of any facility in the state. At the same time, the area encompasses some of the most densely populated immigrant communities in the state.
U.S. Ecology North received over 22,000 tons of hazardous waste in 2017. 98.7% was imported from outside of Wayne County. Yet, after five years of community resistance, the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE) granted a license alteration that allows the facility to expand its storage capacity from 76,118 tons to 676,939 tons, a nearly 9-fold increase. Additionally, the license enables U.S. Ecology to convert three 30,000-gallon pits for the treatment of hazardous waste.
On Monday, July 27, the Great Lakes Environmental Law Center submitted a discrimination complaint to EGLE on behalf of community members seeking to finally put an end to the practices that have allowed this discriminatory burden to mount. At its core, this complaint seeks not only to ensure compliance with the federal civil rights law to which it is bound but also to aid EGLE in achieving its mission of assuring environmental justice for all Michiganders.
The complaint includes firsthand testimony of victims, scientific studies, and analysis of dozens of datasets, as well as historical and legal context. In all, the complaint builds an eye-opening case for our state to alter its practices to protect the people, no matter their race or national origin, from predatory corporations perpetuating our nation’s history of racist practices in pursuit of millions of dollars for executives at the expense of Michigan’s people of color.
Through this complaint, we hope to be one step closer to standing side-by-side with EGLE and state leadership in unwaveringly putting into practice a deeply held belief that black and brown lives do matter.
The entire complaint can be viewed below.
Michigan's Plan to Reduce Nutrient Pollution in Lake Erie Asks Detroiters to Bear a Disproportionate Burden
Today, in partnership with the University of Detroit Mercy Environmental Law Clinic, the Great Lakes Environmental Law Center submitted comments critiquing Michigan’s Adaptive Management Plan for Lake Erie. This Plan describes how Michigan plans to reduce the nutrient pollution flowing to Lake Erie in an effort to limit the intensity and frequency of toxic algae blooms that have plagued the Western Basin for the past several summers.
Lake Erie has struggled with water quality issues for almost 60 years, and in recent years the lake has experienced persistent and intense cyanobacteria blooms. Currently, agricultural run-off is a primary driver of Lake Erie’s severe algae blooms, but, rather than address the agricultural pollution, Michigan has focused on requiring upgrades to wastewater treatment plants to limit combined sewer overflows. In 1996, the City of Detroit began to implement a “Long-Term Combined Sewer Overflow Control Program” to address the discharge of untreated wastewater, resulting from storms, into local rivers. To date, more than $1.2 billion has been spent to control sewage overflows. Detroit ratepayers have been responsible for 83% of the cost of these controls. The City of Detroit has periodically had to revise the program as several reports have shown that the increasing rates have been a high burden to residents of the City of Detroit.
The City of Detroit combines water and sewer charges for its residents, essentially creating one bill. If a ratepayer cannot afford any portion of their water or sewer bill, they are at risk of having their water service shutoff. As funding has been funneled into updating city wastewater treatment centers, sewer and water charges have spiked for Detroit residents. In 2014, the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department (DWSD) discontinued service for up to 27,000 customers behind on their payments. Detroiters often pay up to 10% to 20% of their earnings on their water bill, while the EPA recommends water bills cost no more than 4.5% of a household’s earning. A 2018 University of Michigan study found that to pay their water bill, Detroit households made substantial sacrifices: over 80% cut back on their rent or property tax, 82% cut back on their clothing purchases, 63% cut back on produce purchases, and 40% cut back on medicine purchases. Increasing rates have forced many Detroiters to reduce spending on basic necessities, affecting physical health, mental and emotional health, and financial wellbeing. Low-income households have been hit particularly hard, often paying over 13% of their monthly income for water, forcing them to sacrifice other basic needs. There are assistance programs in place, but data shows they are widely insufficient.
As low-income and urban residents have been forced to pay for pollution reductions, agriculture has largely been left alone. It was not until 2016 that Michigan even put forth a plan to address agricultural pollution in Lake Erie. Furthermore, the plan put forth relies on entirely voluntary action, which is then rewarded through state or federal subsidies. While rural and suburban communities have been compensated for addressing pollution, low-income and communities of color in Detroit have been forced to pay for wastewater plant renovations. This has effectively created a system where urban communities of color have subsidized rural and suburban areas’ ability to continue with their status quo.
GLELC and NRDC Formally Request Declaratory Ruling Voiding Administrative Consent Orders Violating Michigan Lead and Copper Rule’s Partial Lead Service Line Replacement Ban
The Great Lakes Environmental Law Center (“GLELC”) and the Natural Resources Defense Council (“NRDC”) filed a Request for Declaratory Ruling with the Michigan Department of Great Lakes, Energy, and the Environment (“EGLE”) seeking a ruling to declare certain Administrative Consent Orders (“ACOs”) unlawful and void because they violate the Michigan Lead and Copper Rule by allowing partial lead service replacements in violation of Michigan’s Lead and Copper Rule.
Prompted by the Flint Water Crisis, EGLE revised the Michigan Lead and Copper Rule to ban partial lead service line replacements, unless it is necessary due to an emergency repair. Partial lead service line replacements have been shown to cause increased concentrations of lead in drinking water. The adoption of the ban on partial lead service line replacements was celebrated by public health advocates for being an important measure to protect the public.
Since the adoption of this ban, EGLE has quietly entered into Administrative Consent Orders (“ACOs”) with at least three municipalities that unlawfully authorize the municipalities to conduct partial lead service replacements in circumstances other than in emergency repairs. At least two of these ACOs, one with the City of Dearborn and one with the City of Milan, are still in effect and remain so for an indefinite period of time. These ACOs were entered into without any public notice or input, and without satisfying key requirements in the Michigan and Federal Safe Drinking Water Act that exist to safeguard residents from lead in drinking water.
“The ban on partial lead service line replacements is a key public health provision in the revised Michigan Lead and Copper Rule, and we’re troubled and concerned to see that EGLE is not only declining to enforce the provision, but appears to be entering into agreements with water suppliers that completely re-write the standard behind closed doors,” said Nick Leonard, Executive Director of the Great Lakes Environmental Law Center. “We do not believe that EGLE has the authority to contract around the Michigan Lead and Copper Rule and we’re asking them to eliminate this practice and declare their prior Administrative Consent Orders as void.”
“After taking one step forward by promulgating the most protective Lead & Copper Rule in the nation, EGLE has not taken two steps back by allowing water suppliers to do these partial lead service line replacements –placing in jeopardy the health and wellbeing of residents in the very communities it sought to protect when it revised the Michigan Lead and Copper Rule,” said Jeremy Orr, Attorney for Natural Resources Defense Council. “Our Request for Declaratory Ruling from EGLE is a simple, yet fundamental ask: follow your own rules. These invalid Consent Orders should be ripped up, any existing partial lead service line replacement projects should cease, and there should be no future accommodations for water systems who are looking to use these types of Consent Orders as a vehicle to skirt the rules that are meant to ensure that all Michiganders have access to clean and affordable drinking water.”
EGLE has 60 days to take action on the Request for Declaratory Ruling. EGLE can either grant the request, deny the Request, ask for further clarification of the facts, or advise that EGLE requires additional time conduct a review.
Michigan's Drinking Water State Revolving Fund Fails to Address the Water Affordability Crisis in Environmental Justice Communities
In 2018, Michigan significantly revised the State’s Lead and Copper Rule, the primary regulation controlling lead in drinking water. The Rule, which is regarded as the strongest in the nation, was widely lauded by drinking water advocates as a necessary response to address the shortcomings of the federal lead and copper rule, which were exposed during the course of the Flint Water Crisis.
One of the key requirements of Michigan’s revised Rule is that it requires every community water system to replace the entire portion of all lead service lines by 2041, or on another schedule approved by the Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy. While this is the only way to effectively eliminate the risk of lead in drinking water, it comes with costs. While estimates vary, the cost to replace lead service lines generally ranges from $3,000 to $5,000 per line. With an estimate of 460,000 lead service lines in the State, the costs can quickly become daunting. This is of particular concern in environmental justice communities, which generally have high numbers of lead service lines, and which are already struggling with unaffordable water bills. Access to affordable and safe drinking water in many of Michigan’s cities, including Detroit and Flint, is tenuous and, for many residents, already non-existent. As such, it’s important that creative financing solutions are developed to remedy the existing and continuously growing crisis of access to affordable and safe drinking water.
The primary source of federal funds for drinking water infrastructure is the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund program. Established under the Safe Drinking Water Act, this program provides states with federal capitalization grants to fund drinking water infrastructure projects, so long as the state matches 20% of the federal grant. The state fund is generally used to issue low-interest loans to local water suppliers to pay for infrastructure upgrades. Historically, only “disadvantaged communities” have been eligible to receive grants instead of loans.
Michigan has recently published a draft of its “Intended Use Plan” for fiscal year 2020, which describes how the State plans to utilize its Drinking Water State Revolving Fund to pay for drinking water infrastructure upgrades. Particularly for environmental justice communities, these funds are more important than ever. However, the State’s Intended Use Plan leaves a lot to be desired:
The Plan proposes to provide grants for drinking water infrastructure improvements to wealthy communities, such as Lake Orion. Historically, grants have only been provided to “disadvantaged communities” that are struggling with water affordability issues. Providing these grants to wealthy communities fails to direct funding to the communities with the greatest need.
The Plan only provides 15% of its funds to “disadvantaged communities” in the form of grants. Both Illinois and Ohio have proposed to provide 55% of its funds in the form of grants.
Historically, Michigan has provided a single, flat interest rate for all communities regardless of economic status. Every other Great Lakes states, provide some type of discounted interest rate for environmental justice communities, some offering interest rates as low as 0%.
Michigan determines which cities qualify as a “disadvantaged community” by primarily relying on median annual household income. The American Water Works Association has stated the use of median annual household income for this purpose is “seriously flawed” and fails to accurately measure affordability.
Submit Your Comment On Michigan’s 2020 Intended Use Plan
How: Submit comments via email to Karol Patton at pattonk@michigan.gov
When: Comments must be submitted by 5:00pm Wednesday, 8/28
Link to 2020 Intended Use Plan: https://www.michigan.gov/documents/egle/egle-fd-mfs-DWRF-draft-DWiupppl2020_661272_7.pdf