Time Magazine cover http://time.com/4187507/time-flint-water-crisis-cover/
The Flint, Michigan water crisis represents how America treats its poor. We have third world conditions right here in the U.S.A.
I worked as a multimedia journalist in the Appalachian Mountains two years and saw a totally different world. Not all residents, but many in small towns lived so far below the poverty line that I often encountered families living in shacks, children outside with no shoes and elderly stricken with illnesses that they attributed to nearby factories and plants. But this wasn’t just the case in one media market.
I’ve worked in Maryland, SW Florida, Tri-Cities Tennessee/Virginia and Western New York. Poverty — we’re talking 3rd world style poverty– is very present in the United States of America. There are so many places where residents are arguably secondary to corporations and environmental pollution is more prevalent than often reported.
It freaks me out how casually I can utter “American ignores it’s own 3rd world poverty” when my DC beltway colleagues express disbelief over what’s happening in Flint. But I’ve seen this dance too many times. In six years I covered and saw first hand:
Manatee County, Fla. – American Beryllium Company plant water, soil and air contamination. Also low birthrates and high infant mortality cases in a nearby zip code.
Kingsport, Tenn. – Eastman Chemical Co air and water contamination related illnesses. The number of news tips I got from people linking their cancer cases and various illnesses to this was frightening.
Niagara Falls, N.Y. – Love Canal toxic waste dump residual impact.
I got so many “not in my backyard” tips on environmental pollution that I swear my nickname became “NIMBY Nicki.”
Poverty hurts health care. While I was covering Obama and McCain stomping in the SW Virginia panhandle for battleground state votes in 2008, many residents in that region were attending Remote Area Medical Clinics (RAM Clinics) that often came to the Tri-Cities, TN and VA offering free medical, dental and vision exams to those in need. These are tax paying Americans that can’t afford basic health care.
Then finally I get home to Baltimore and the blighted vacant homes, joblessness, substance abuse and educational disparities (that destined me for private school) continue.
These were all, and continue to be considered “local news.” Yet the pollution associated with these issues clearly have national impact.
Jake May/The Flint Journal/AP
Flint, Michigan has been fighting with the corrosive water and lead poisoning more than two years, but just now we are paying attention. It’s been reported on MANY times, but somehow poor Americans’ cries for help fall on deaf ears. Now the nation is rallying around Flint and racing to donate bottle water to the Great Lakes city.
(SIDE NOTE: Has any bottled water company independently donated water to Flint? )
My point to this op-ed is, Americans do not need to look far or internationally to help out people in need or living in 3rd world conditions. We have many around our nation. The next time you want to “help fight world hunger” or “fund clean drinking water” add the words “in America” to your philanthropic Google search.
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