I don't get it. Why doesn't this mention the billion-dollar plan signed by Governor Newsom today? Though it hadn't been signed by your deadline, it wasn't a secret and it is aimed squarely at this problem.
11
Criminality and incompetence at the top.
Too many people using too many resources at the bottom.
5
Dirty water. Crumbling infrastructure. Horrible schools. High taxes. But let’s keep those borders open and keep those poor people coming to this sanctuary state!
16
@M
Are you kidding me? If only it were that simple. Simple-minded Americans are not helping the well-being of this country!
8
Inhumanity is inhumanity. No matter what the reasoning is.
9
The problems are because the State Water Resources Control Board refuses to enforce any laws against these "poor" districts - especially the ones in "rural" areas like the Northern part of the State. The main way they do that is by creating "rules" that clearly conflict with the laws.
One of the very worst is in Hornbrook, right next to the Oregon border, where the locals are actually allowing some homeless bum in a trailer to live at their water plant (right next to the freeway, so easy to spot). The guy burned down their main water tank due to negligence, too - and yet the State hasn't made them rebuild it, nor get any licensed water operator there. All that despite the Legislature passing new laws in 2017 that made such unlicensed operation, and the allowing of it, criminal.
9
I had my first taste of bottled water when I lived in San Francisco during the 1980s. The same goes when I retired and moved to Florida. The water in both states was was never drinkable from the faucet like the water drank in Brooklyn during my youthful years as a New Yorker.
4
This is par for the course in California after it adopted what is essentially one-party rule. It's not too different from SF where homless-ness is a terrible problem.
10
Unbelievable. Wouldn't be worse in a third world country!
10
Use an Atmospheric Water Generator to make your own water. Done.
3
Does AOC think Compton is a “concentration camp?”
Sure sounds like it; too many people, not enough resources.
10
Yeah. Let’s mock any politician who shows the slightest bit of concern for poor desperate people.
14
She should start by helping the people of the Bx.
That is her sworn duty to help Americans, don’t know if
Jerome Ave. is in her district, but it is closer thank the southern border; home first.
6
This is just one of many reasons not to trust 'government.'
Any bets those in the California State Water Resources Control Board each get paid over $100,000/year?
7
You beat me to this comment. Governments everywhere have been overpaying employees for decades ... then frosting the cake with early retirement, retiree health and COLA increases. We now reap the whirlwind. We need massive public bankruptcies to trim benefits and perks (whether "contracted" or not) and emergency efforts to fix as many decades of neglect. Legislators have bought votes with pay and benefit increases and they have "found" the money by neglecting or deferring maintenance. Fire 70% of the administrators; consolidate political units; pay bondholders a dime on the dollar and start over with a domestic Marshall Plan. Use immigrant labor who won't demand union pay scale and give them visas that they can redeem for citizenship down the pothole-free road.
3
Yeah. Let’s wipe out any middle class jobs still standing. And let’s keep Social Security as low as possible. The elderly don’t need to eat.
8
Fear not, the bush family owns the largest aquifer in Paraguay I’m sure they’ll only be too happy to sell us water…
https://agorafinancial.com/2015/04/24/why-did-george-bush-buy-nearly-300000-acres-in-paraguay/
6
Just a few weeks ago, I received a flyer in my mailbox from our local district telling us where to go online to look up our local water quality. We get this every year but I suspect this is probably because I live in a wealthy neighborhood.
It would have been interesting if NY Times could link to such a database so residents can see what the water is like in their area and put pressure on local officials. Although from the article, it looks like there is no central database.
Someone(s) also need to get punished for the misuse of funds. I serve on 2 boards and we monitor revenues and expenses carefully. It sounds like someone was embezzling and/or borrowing $$ using their position in the company or on the Board.
13
I thought California had a $12 billion surplus. Why can’t they upgrade their infrastructure?
10
@Jackson Because the "Surplus" does not take into account the $10's of Billions of unfunded state pension obligations.
14
I was surprised when moving from Palo Alto to Ithaca NY, that my water bill was higher in Ithaca, per gallon, than in Palo Alto.
Much of CA's water is massively subsidized by the Federal government.
The City of San Francisco pays only $30,000 per year for its use of Hetch Hetchy. That is roughly the cost of an average one-bedroom apartment in the City.
The "rent" hasn't changed since 1913 - 106 years ago
10
Here in Chicago we have ALOT of good cool fresh water
We can use all of the obsolete fossil fuel pipe lines ship to California, pay off our pension fund and it is a win win
2
Perhaps more diversity in the boards overseeing the failing districts would help?
You know, maybe include people who know what they are doing?
8
Interesting article. Live in NCalifornia and had at one time lived in Fremont, CA, and the tap water was definitely brown and had a slight odor. Could never simply fill a pot of water or take a bath. I remember the situation resolved itself but not sure what took place to improve the water quality. None-the-less it was problematic.
3
When you invite the 3rd world into your country/state/city/community; you become a 3rd world community. The local water board that looted it for everything it had and then some was acting just like the local officials from their home lands.
21
Oh so that’s it. Low wages has nothing to do with it.
3
@Jim K
Yep. and then everybody clams up and nobody knows nuthin'.
4
Have officials drink this water when they say it is safe to drink.
11
Too many people and too little water sums up California's water predicament (in addition to an antiquated governance structure).
20
So when these companys are taken over by large companys and the rates go up who do you think Newsom and his criminal empire will force to pay those bills? Can you say new tax.
6
@Tommy Hudspeth . Maybe a second or fifth look at their $ 9 billion dollar prison system. How many non-violent inmates are the state warehousing? Just a thought.
4
It’s like Chinatown was a documentary.
12
@Malx
Exactly! That movie still holds up. It's all about the water -- who controls it and where it goes.
'Water wars' are certainly real.
Here, we've now been saddled by Trump and local R's with FoxConn(a true 'con'), who really just came for our fresh water. Managed to break an 8 city / province (Canada) compact to divert salt-free lake Michigan water to its manufacturing plant. Talk about wrong and short-sighted priorities.
A lot of havoc since, people uprooted from their homes via 'eminent domain,' etc. Terrible.
4
@jazz one Which Great Lake state was it that gave Nestle billion of gallons to ensure the never ending production of their unhealthy drinks? The CEO actually said "drinking water is not a human right." Greed trumps all. No pun....
9
California has always set the pace for the rest of the country. Now it is showing how much trouble the country will be in in a very short time owing to climate change and environmental irresponsibility.
9
They have too many people overtaxing resources and starting fires, defecating in the streets.
Nature does like to be over taxed with too many humans.
7
I wish the Dems knew how to market the Green New Deal, but they are so hapless.
In this case the GND would refurbish the whole system at once, using American workers, paid for by the government. Yes, there will be debt, but the country loved the GOP tax cut for the rich. Why not this? (Because the whole idea is radical and socialist and no American like this plan. Giving money to those who do not need it is American. Fixing infrastructure is socialist and bad. Always.)
13
US water infrastructure was set up to fail. This is not a California issue, or a Democrat/Republican issue, or a socialist/capitalist issue.
Because of trends in real estate over the last 70 years, there are far too many systems (~70,000 vs. 1 - 10 in most countries), which means thousands that are owned and operated by people that lack the capability to do so.
This has been combined with absurdly low customer bills that do not cover the cost of service, let alone necessary maintenance and upgrades. Pipes and treatment plants don't pay for themselves.
Until we have consolidation and significantly increase the price of water and wastewater to reflect the true cost of service, this problem is only getting worse across the country.
Finally, there are pros and cons to both public and private ownership models and both will need to be part of the solution.
16
Water will be worth more than gold in the not too distant future, yet the president will allow regulation rollbacks to make it easier to pollute our waterways.
I think there is intelligent life out there in the universe and they are laughing at us.
10
The article points out a level of corruption normally seen only in third world countries. Given 'demographic change' beloved of open borders Democrats, this is the tip of the iceberg.
19
There is not a single Democrat who advocates open borders. Treating asylum seekers and immigrants with humanity is the issue
4
One immediate fix for a family is a home filtration system. A good under the counter reverse osmosis system is $500 and a half hour of do-it-yourself time. Much cheaper than bottled water over the course of the year. I have one and the water from it is excellent. A whole house system, also about $500, would make it safe and comfortable to clean and shower with.
10
Ironic that the grotesque Trump tax reform benefiting corporations is raising their infrastructure costs not to mention the huge social costs incurred by the population.
Time lost, transport, productivity, health, vehicular costs are huge and grow disproportionately with poor and deteriorating infrastructure. Deferred infrastructure like health is landing us in the emergency ward. It is a slippery slope to morbidity. Add to this the fact that maintentance costs increase disproportionately when deferred.
The Trump administration has gutted tax revenue to reward vested interests and reneged on its promised infrastructure plan which it can no longer afford. It's unconscionable attempts to roll back social safety net spending to pay for it were rebuffed in Congress. It is playing Russian roulette with our infrastructure and consequently basic industrial and community welfare.
Ironic that countries around the world accord priority to infrastructure investments. But the US, captured by vested interests and a cartoonish president has turned his back on this essential government task.
A gentleman "D" infrastructure rating may look good after a couple more years of Trump. Get used to it --brown water looks a lot like tea, is apparently drinkable and manganese is a vitamin.
The GoP is betting the middle class won't wake to 'brown water'. It's worse than Russian roulette because we're all going to pay in the end. We're paying now.
7
Chris P
And Ketchup is a vegetable.
1
And yet fracking continues on - supported by Jerry Brown and not fully addressed by Gavin Newsom. Fracking - a sort of modern-day gold rush operation, but for oil ("black gold"!) is a key factor in destroying the water table on which much of the state depends. Not only does this oil - like all oil mining - contribute to the climate disaster we face, but it also destroys the precious water we all need, and the land on which both are found.
14
As California goes, so goes the nation . . . . . or something like that. Which is cool when California introduces the rest of nation to surfing or The Grateful Dead or recycling. Not so much with wildfires, smog, choking car traffic, and now toxic public water supplies.
5
@Tonyp152
Oh, I am sure the East Coast as a whole has its own problems with old water systems. It is a national problem of which Cal is just one example.
6
@gratis Of course you're correct on that. My point wasn't to belittle or blame California, but rather to point out that the state is often an indicator of current and future trends that, if not already, could be brewing in your city. Sort of like consider what goes on in California as a warning no matter where you are.
6
@gratis
It is true that crumbling infrastructure adds to the problems with water, However, the NYS Governor voted down Fracking in NY because it does wreak havoc on the water tables and pollute the environment. However, in NYC, there are water testing stations all over the boroughs and the water is frequently tested spot by spot. Homeowners get a yearly report in the mail and anyone can read the water report online. Up until a few years ago however, many accounts were not paying their water bills and there was no enforcement by shutting off water. Now the accounts pay. As of now, I am living in Nevada and I would give anything to have a glass of sweet NYC water right from the tap. Here in Nevada, you cannot drink the mineral filled water from the tap. And though I get bills, i have not seen a water quality report. You have to have a whole house water softener system installed so you can do laundry and get the soap off of you in the shower. This water still dries out your skin and your scalp. A whole house water system costs about 3000. new to install and the salt pellets about 150. a year. This does not include any filter on your kitchen faucet were you to dare attempt to drink this water day to day. Installing a water filter in your kitchen does not guarantee you can even drink the water so you have to buy bottled water or have it delivered. The tap water is not potable water. I am thinking of returning to NYC over this one issue.
5
It sounds like money needs to be moved downhill in LA county. The people who are doing the the laundry, pumping the gas, working in the convenience stores, etc., need to have the basic services needed to live: clean water, electricity, access to education, all of that good stuff. I'm guessing there are laborers out there who would be happy to make that happen, if they're paid to do the work.
Richie Rich needs to cough up some cash.
5
That's the way it goes in the best, the most incredibly efficient idiocracy on this planet. Almost 60% of discretionary spending on Pentagon and warmongering. Crumbs for basic human needs.
10
Well, we can't all live in Canada. Maybe we should make it a state . . . hhhmmmm . . . nope - too cold.
1
"...officials say the water in the Sativa district is safe to drink; the brown color is classified as a secondary, aesthetic violation, according to federal standards."
How about having those "officials" appear on television to drink a nice big 8 ounce glass of cold, brown water - just to show the residents how confident they are that it's safe.
20
Thank you for pointing out — albeit too deep into the article — that this is not a case of toxic water provided by the district, but brown water emerging from old pipes. That is not the full explanation, however. Water balance determines how “hungry” the water is, and how likely it is to leach material from pipes. That fact was often left out of reporting on the Flint, Michigan, water crisis. In that case, changes at the water treatment plant (and, as I recall, water sourcing) led to the pH, hardness and saturation of the municipal water changing, and subsequent lead leaching from pipes that had not been a problem before. That problem could have been addressed quickly, as an interim measure, by adjusting the water. But instead everyone started screaming about toxic water harming children. Even though it wasn’t the water itself, but the combination of water balance and ancient pipes.
Manganese is not overtly toxic (it can be if you consume too much of it). You need manganese in your diet. The itching and the brown sludge in washers and boilers both sound like a combination of unbalanced water and chloramines (toxic byproduct of water chlorination when there is too much organic material in the water) and rust. Not manganese.
(NB: I have a well, and I maintain my swimming pool. I deal with water balance all the time. I treat my well water for pH because otherwise it leaches copper from my pipes and I get blue stains in my sinks. Sometimes i get iron in the water, too.)
9
Addendum: In the old days of newspaper reporting an article like this might have a sidebar of water chemistry. Water balance is a combination of pH, total alkalinity, hardness, etc. Water can be saturated or not. One measurement affects the other, and in well water (the source of water for this community) these values can fluctuate with changes in the water table, rain levels, or a broken sewer pipe or street runoff polluting the well (the ecoli mentioned). Aggressive water can cause metals to precipitate out, and you might see that coming out of faucets. It can also loosen up up the built-up crust of scale in old pipes, and free up metals there. Or it can just eat into the pipes.
So this water district failed on several levels, in monitoring and treating the water. The system’s pipes may be shot, as well, but it’s more than an infrastructure problem.
San Francisco gets its water from snow melt, so it’s good stuff. But they have several covered reservoirs (big tanks, really) around town, to help with water pressure. When I lived there they used to superchlorinated those tanks to clean them occasionally, and our water would be horrid for a time. It would make you itch terribly, and it stank. That’s chloramines. The same stuff that makes you itch in a dirty swimming pool.
Finally, you can buy an OK reverse osmosis system for less than $200 on Amazon. If someone is paying almost $200 a month for bottled water...
12
The short history of our country is exploitation of abundant resources. That era is coming to an end. The technology is available to “fix” the problems, but all I see in every situation, is the greedy struggle to profit from the last dregs..if it be fracking the last drop of oil, or irrigating alfalfa with the last drops of water..and whatever other commodities can be sold for profits, Profiteering is an unstoppable force. As resources dwindle it will only get uglier and uglier. The Los Angeles Area was a veritable paradise, with abundant ground water, albeit some significant flooding issues, and small scale agriculture flourished until postwar industrialization and population growth. Again, the technology exists to revitalize urban Los Angeles, but the motivation and tax structure fails us. New development spreads further and further out into wild lands and desert, areas that would be best left wild. The rot and neglect of urban Los Angeles, the lack of innovative urban redevelopment, and the business as usual grossly profit driven development schemes define us.
20
Another example of America's crumbling infrastructure. When will the next bridge collapse as it did across the Mississippi River in Minneapolis, MN in 2007? Massive tax cuts for the 1% but no money for infrastructure on which we all depend in our daily lives.
Where does it end?
6
@Jacquie - It will end once Americans quit voting for either Republicans or Democrats. Both parties have screwed us all over time and time again.
The Flint, Michigan water problem happened when Barack/Biden were in office. Barack flew to Detroit pointing fingers at the Republican governor who pointed fingers at others.
Meanwhile, Cher called some people in Iceland and flew in 200,000 bottles of clean water to the people. And the pipes are still in place because the rich politicians could care less.
7
@tom harrison . That would be Fmr. Gov. Rick Snyder and the various Emergency Mangers brought in to "save" the towns. In Flint even GM would not use the water because it was damaging metals used in car production.
1
The problem here is common to many small towns/counties in California and throughout the nation. Ceding control of basic services to local authorities yields great potential advantages, but relies on an educated and involved community to administer these services. In small, usually poor, communities there have been instances of a few obscenely corrupt individuals taking over the town and looting its resources.
That California has outstripped its water supply is a separate issue, but many communities without guaranteed water supply continue to grow and must purchase water from agricultural entities that have priority claims to water. Such growers are perhaps coming to the realization that they can use their water more profitably growing houses rather than almonds.
This however, is not a problem in this community. They have access to Los Angeles water, but lack the political maturity to distribute it properly.
11
@Paul Ephraim If you are saying that uneducated "average Joes" have no business running local boards, much less water systems, you're dead right.
2
Here in San Francisco I can say this: I’ve lived here for fourty years. In the past our water was so pristine that I could pour a glass of water for my bedside and it was perfect for days. Now after two days that glass of water is clouded and tastes of mold. The glass itself is slimy and must be washed. Meantime the cost of that water has increased by several hundred percent, and charges are levied equally regardless of household size, meaning families have huge water bills. Businesses that use water have left the city taking jobs with them. Inquiries to our city water department about the quality decline are ignored.
13
@Mia - If I take a glass of Seattle rainwater and put it by my bedside for several days I can expect algae growth unless I oxygenate the water. The glass will be slimy. Hydroponics 101.
It sounds like San Francisco used to add chloramine to the water which will not dissipate when exposed to air. Chlorine dissipates in about 24 hours and it sounds like the city changed its practice.
4
@tom harrison Our once pristine SF water comes from Sierra snow melt. Then the utility switched from chlorine to chloramine and it now tastes like swamp water.
2
@Someone else - Most of your water comes from the Hetch Hetchy reservoir but your city also adds in Alameda groundwater runoff along with Hayward county aquifers. And yes, back in 2004 it switched to chloramine.
I used to live in San Francisco when the water was chlorinated.
2
California is more concerned with providing benefits to people in this country unlawfully than providing for its own citizens. This not a funding issue it is how existing funding should be utilized.
19
These "districts" are funded by fees and other assessments. California has a few thousand of them, not just water.
Unfortunately, they are insular with very little oversight or auditing. That has to change. Hopefully Gov. Newsom and his staff are reading this piece.
3
This is so sad. Good plumbing is a major difference between developed places and undeveloped. Clean water means less disease, better health, and more thriving families. You'd think in a state like California (which I love and depend on to stand up to horrible federal policy and be an example for others), the home of Silicon Valley and Hollywood, you would have the money, know-how and creativity to fix these systems and provide clean water. Yet again, poor people are left behind. The consequence of inaction will doom us all.
19
On one hand, California, long ruled by Democrats, just voted to provide free health care to illegal immigrants, and has long tried to thwart federal efforts to reign in illegal immigration and deport illegal immigrants.
On the other hand, California seems to have done little or nothing to take steps to improve failed and failing water supplies in a thousand communities.
I guess California’s priorities are clear: illegal immigrants above American citizens.
18
@Mon Ray Two names: Sam Brownback and Chris Kobach. Heal thy self.
1
Ain't just the water. The top tax rate was 70 to 90% until Reagan. Before him, the infrastructure system built was the envy of the world and copied by other countries as soon as they were able. Airports, new highway systems, universities, low-cost electricity, water, etc. were available in every corner of the country. Nixon, for example, started the Environmental Protection Agency. But President Reagan sharply moved the balance between public and private funding toward the private and the public has suffered. Those votes for Trump expecting change is only one example of the crisis in our body politic.
31
The problem, you see, is that there are too many regulations. If there were no regulations, there would be no wild expectations that the water would be safe to drink.
7
Perhaps the problems are worse in California due to a byzantine management system, but no doubt similar problems exist throughout the country. Our aversion to taxes has left us with crumbling infrastructure everywhere: we often unwilling even to pay to maintain systems our grandparents and great-grandparents happily paid to build, much less pay for more infrastructure.
Fortunately, that's not the case everywhere. My small local water system was shut down several times a year due to leaks followed by the inevitable boil water orders when it came back online. On top of that, there was the occasional conserve water orders when levels fell. A few years ago, we total a complete failure was possible. We voted to increase our property tax for the next 30 years to rebuild the system. None of those problems have reoccurred: money well spent.
10
Many years ago, we bought a home in a housing development that had a private mutual water company. We did not fully understand the responsibilities and implications of doing so at the time, nor did the majority of people living within the development. Most of the homeowners were looking at the cheap cost of the HOA/water fees when buying homes, not the aging infrastructure or precarious water treatment system.
When my spouse joined the community HOA, he learned the implications of that responsibility more clearly. During the time he served as an unpaid volunteer, he educated himself about water treatment and was licensed to treat water in California. He arranged for the entire board to receive training from the state that specifically reviewed the responsibilities that volunteer water board members in California are obligated to. Primarily, what he came to understand was that he and the board were ultimately responsible for the health and well being of all the residents of the development we lived in. He took this seriously and worked hard so that other board members and residents understood the implications of that.
People don’t think about their water until it isn’t running. No one called my husband to say thank you or to ask how they could help with the board. They did call when their water wasn’t running.
We bought a different home several years ago. A public water system was one of my husband’s criteria.
No one likes the government until they need it.
65
When I first visited Europe in the 1960s, I was shocked that water was consumable only when purchased in a bottle and not freely from the tap. Doing the latter risked drinking toxic chemicals and pathogenic bacteria in amounts sufficient to make you ill.
To see the same problems emerging in this country in more and more communities is another example of this country's infrastructure degenerating. Why must it always take deadly consequences for problems to be addressed?
14
$150 a month on bottled water... ouch.
There are great filtering systems out there that you can fill with non-drinkable water and get potable water on the other end in about 20 min.
I have a system called Berkey at home (not advertising, I have no stake in the company), it’s gravity fed, no pressure or electricity required. It works very well on untreated water as well (think lakes, ponds...)
I haven’t bought a bottle of water since then. I just hope someone facing issues with water sees that comments and knows there are alternatives out there!
One of my clients has a non-profit financing and distributing these same filters in Puerto Rico where many areas still have no drinking water.
The cost is rapidly amortised and filters are only needed every 8 years... you could get a model big enough to even have enough water to bathe a baby with :) (the biggest model goes up to 6 gallons)
8
Yes, Water, utilities, bridges, electrical grids. etc. all need lots of repair and replacement. So, we decrease taxes on the rich and increase our defense budgets.
25
@RichardHead the Greatest Generation (nad a bit before and after) built up a great infrastructure in this country...unfortunately it costs a fortune to maintain, not to mention replace and upgrade...if not maintained and upgraded on a consistent basis it will cost even more...
6
"The county is currently looking for a water utility to take Sativa over permanently, most likely a privately owned water company."
Bad idea. Corporations have no business providing essential services.
14
As California goes, so goes the nation................
5
Check this for a possible solution in Compton and elsewhere.
www.originclear.com/company-news/enough-is-enough-originclear-and-basketball-legend-cedric-ceballos-to-present-compton-water-campaign-at-aspen-conference
This is a huge problem globally. We don’t realise it when water is available in plenty. We waste plenty of water then. In Hyderabad I faced this problem when my bore well became dry. I had to entirely depend upon tanker water by shelling out lot of money and then wait for hours for the tanker to come. So couple of years back I resorted to a simple method of water harvesting. It had cost me around Rs 9500.00 ( $ 1400.00 ) but solved the water problem for three houses that includes two neighbours. However in India, labour and material is cheap since cost of living is cheap especially in cities like Hyderabad. That’s the biggest advantage. We use municipal water for drinking purposes, which is supplied to us on alternate days on hourly basis. We have got our own water filter for drinking purpose.
14
@Sivaram Pochiraju : The amount I mentioned stands corrected as $ 140.00 and not $ 1400.00
3
This is what local control looks like. Water is a human right. Local taxes should not be the funding source. We're all better off when we're all in this together. Oh, you call that socialism? I call that humanity.
21
I miss my well water from property in Northern northern San Luis Obispo County (had to drink it soonly, or the sediment settled out, but that’s what gave it a marvelous taste). I don’t know but the mineral content might’ve had some health benefits also,, because I have never felt stronger or fitter at this late stage in my life... ( who knows, I may drop dead after I submit this blurb)
3
The entire issue of water rights in Western states should be revisited in light of modern realities. California is a wealthy state with high tax rates. There is absolutely no reason that poor communities should drink substandard water.
29
Effective correction of failures and the hazards that result begins with an accurate identification and analysis of causal and contributing factors.
The situation described in this article - contamination of the water supply - clearly points to a deeper, root cause contamination of infrastructure management by pervasive criminality. The documented enabling factors fit the classic criminal triad;
> Motive (illicit profit, theft)
> Means (conspiracy within governing power structures to conceal and confuse public knowledge to avoid detection)
> Opportunity ( an inertial public acceptance of a government persistently devoid of ethical responsibility.)
A deeper dive into that root cause analysis reveals that the contamination manifests as a nationwide cultural phenomenon manipulated by the distracting hostilities that dominate our social and political leadership.
Willowbrook, CA is just one sick little canary in this big poisoned mine.
3
There are plenty of non governmental entities that are misguided and corrupt when dealing with water distribution in this state. I would not put the onus on “government” as much as people in general who take advantage of their positions.
5
There are 2 other problems not addressed in this story:
1. Central Valley agricultural pollution of the water table (pesticides), and,
2. The water budget: How much growth can the state handle as the population (and industry) consumes more of a seasonally variable supply? No one is addressing this.
41
@Slann
Agreed, but this is not just a state-by-state issue. At the heart of environmental problems such as this is overpopulation. Not just California. They may be feeling it first - as is India - but I believe we will all one day be affected.
20
@Slann - I used to live in both L.A. and S.F. One problem with southern California is that the residents insist on green grass that we take for granted here in Seattle. But my neighbors have green grass because almost everyone has rain barrels to collect the rain water. Not to mention there is a 14,000' mountain range 90 miles to the east.
Los Angeles has a pool in most every yard which surely requires a lot of water due to evaporation.
11
Infrastructure is crumbling everywhere. Where I live, bridges and drinking water got a C, and roads and wastewater treatment got a D in a state infrastructure report. Infrastructure spending isn’t a vote getter, the work aggravates and inconveniences people, and the funds just aren’t there in a political environment in which raising taxes to pay for such spending will get you branded a socialist. The flip side is that the wealthy who have outsize political influence in an era of income inequality aren’t as dependent as ordinary folks on infrastructure. They can bypass congested highways and subways in private jets. They can buy their own water. There’s little incentive to support such spending.
224
@AlNewman
Connecticut isn’t taxed enough?
5
@AlNewman. No indication here that Bill Gates uses his private jet to go from his home in Medina to the Gates Foundation in downtown Seattle. With his driver and him in the car they can use the commuter lanes. However, I don't have a driver so I sit in traffic.
3
@kathy
I used to live in Seattle and it was well known that certain deep pockets residents regularly used helicopters to go from their homes to other locations, like the dock where they keep their yacht!
14
The new focus in America is on money...not humanity. The corruption from Washington to the burbs is bone deep. Until the people realize their power for change and take to the streets as in Hong Kong, India and Puerto Rico, nothing will change and it will all come crashing down around all of our ears.
25
@Ardyth . The only incentive americans would require to protest on Hong Kong levels would for their cable and phone service to crash and not work for a week. Now there's an issue we would fight for. Is it wonder the world disrespects us?
Amazing how quickly this breaks down into an argument about which of the two political parties is to blame. In the meantime, deteriorating infrastructure and substandard public services are not addressed. Regardless of political identity, Americans have somehow come to believe that government is a problem that needs to be eliminated, taxes are theft, and income inequality is the virtuous outcome of some kind of freedom. Their will continue to be consequences that flow from these beliefs.
33
California is a collection of little fiefdoms of century-old water rights; that is the root of the problem. The small handfuls of people that control those little fiefdoms make out handsomely at the expense of customers--Sativa is a perfect example.
I have sympathy for the people of Willowbrook if they end up with a private, for-profit water company. The water won't be brown anymore but their bills will skyrocket to the point where bottled water will be a bargain compared to what comes out of the tap. Water should not be for-profit any more than medical care should be.
179
I would say the same thing applies to electricity and communication utilities as well. These are services required for the public good.
15
Just signs of America's silently burgeoning infrastructure crisis. We can see the potholes in our roads, but the decay of bridges, tunnels, dams, electric grids, etc. remains largely unnoticed...until failures occur. Mismanagement, deferred maintenance, fiscal austerity, and political expediency are creating an invisible crisis, whose uncalculated costs are increasing with each passing day.
108
I actually know something about this: calling California’s water system Byzantine is an understatement. I am on the board of a small system. This is no left/right political issue. It stems from the systems being a legacy of the “Wild West” settlement of the state. Our tiny utility is in discussion with a smaller one (14 theoretical customers, 1 actual!) that the county would like to have merge with an adjacent system. We are only slightly larger. The system of water rights, in an arid area, bestows upon us something nearly unworkable. Water boards are elected by the district’s customers from the customers, so finding people with water and management expertise and willing to serve without pay is impossible. The only real solution would be for the counties or state to dissolve and merge all of the small systems. This would be fraught: why would our customers, who receive pure spring water for a low price wish to pay triple for more questionable water? How could I, elected to serve our customers, agree to such a change? How angry would our customers be if the state forced a change?
105
@Pat Roy
Of course there is no perfect solution, there never is. But a socialist country would take over everything, refurbish the whole thing once over a long time with steady long term jobs including engineering, construction, and management, as this is more cost effective. It would be best if the Fed government could fund it, since they could go into debt, similar to the GOP tax break for the rich, except this would be for infrastructure.
Say, that is pretty much the Green New Deal that is too radical for any moderate to even consider.
16
The difference between the huge amount of money California sends to the Federal government to subsidize red states and smaller amount it gets back may be taking its toll. At any rate, with the country’s crumbling infrastructure overall and looming water shortages due to the climate emergency, this is probably only the first wave of problems. Too bad it’s always the poorer communities that suffer first. (I’d also say that any choice between drinking water and health care for undocumented immigrants is a a fake problem.)
135
@Richard L. And yet, when the next 7.1 earthquake hits, who will come to save Californians? The Federal government - not Mexico or China, but the Feds.
When the next wildfire obliterates a small California town, who will spend millions and billions to help the people? Not Mexico, not China, but the Federal government.
This argument that "California gives the most taxes to the nation" is a distraction and total bullpucky.
Add up the costs of Federal aid to this burning, drought-ridden, crime-ridden, "open borders" sham of a state. Add up the disaster aid.
28
@Food Courier, 3 years, have a degree
82 yrs. native Californian, Bay Area. Family arrived from Ireland in 1852. We do pay taxes to the Federal Govt. We do support a good university system and advanced research. We do not have a legislature which should have stopped the planting of acres of water sucking cotton by recent immigrants from India. The cotton is low quality hopsacking. The water table is being tapped at increasing amounts to irrigate this crop; land in the Central Valley where I grew up is sinking. Homes and public buildings are affected by land settling under their foundations. Large developments in Sacramento and suburbs cannot get water hookups due to the drought and an at risk water table. Before irrigation, CA was mostly a desert.
31
@Food Courier, 3 years, have a degree
He did that. You can add up every dollar that California receives from the federal government, and it still comes to less than California contributes in federal taxes. So maybe all the lazy freeloaders in Kansas and Kentucky should be opening their wallets to solve this problem, since they've been receiving welfare provided by the taxpayers of California for decades.
69
This is just the tip of a growing water crisis iceberg. While Flint rightfully got national headlines because of government cruelty and corruption, water systems all over the country are failing.
This crisis is especially acute in the Southwest. At the end of the day we need a national water plan that offers local communities federal support for failing water systems.
How do we pay for all this infrastructure? Easy, cut back on trump's tax cuts for the wealthy and reallocate that money where it's needed.
13
@Drspock
Since when is water infrastructure a federal problem? NYC's school system supplies bottled drinking water to 50% of its public schools because the tap water is contaminated. NYC collects user fees from building owners and consumers that are more than enough to maintain and improve the water system. Instead, NYC skims off the "rent" they charge the municipal system for other purposes.
Flint, governed by Democrats forever, got a lot of attention, but NYC, also a deep blue municipality is not much better off. It is not unusual for there to be water main collapses that floods the city.
Why is it that NYC dumps one million gallons per year of raw sewage along with millions of gallons of partially treated effluent into the navigable waters of America? It's not because water and sewer user fees are not sufficient to support twenty first century infrastructure. It is because your local and state governments are unable or unwilling to manage.
The obvious way to finance water infrastructure would be for the municipalities to use the fees charged to user. Not to create the illusion that it is somehow related to the federal taxpayer.
2
Let's be clear what the problem is here: Management and oversight of this water company which has been for years (if not decades) incompetent at best. And the residents in this area have to take some responsibility as well, because they are the ones who elect these board members, who have no idea what a water company is...
We see the same problem in other places here in California as well, where people get elected to school boards, water districts, etc., who have no competence serving on these boards. But often these elections are so far down the ballot, that no one has an idea who the candidates are...
3
Fiscal rectitude is not an American trait. Companies that maintain cash reserves are targets for rapacious Wall Street pillagers. Small water districts that have cash ... see the cash mysteriously disappear once the original honest workers leave. Pensions for the future are not funded; this is why companies want to throw the burden on workers (without raising pay to compensate). Even the backup plan, use credit to pay for future expenses, fails when the credit lines are max'd out (see: ballooning Federal Government deficit).
The poorer areas will fail first, but eventually the rot will reach the wealthy. Only by then, it will be too late (see: French Revolution [as an aside, I don't recall seeing what happened to all the pensioners' income streams during and after the French Revolution. I do know that retired royal horses had a grim fate.]).
3
As with many articles, the NYT is lamenting aging infrastructure and the usual political system failures without going to the root cause of the issue. The root cause is simply that water is treated here like an everlasting commodity which should cost close to nothing. Of course then there is no money for upkeep, because nobody is paying into the system. People have no qualms to spent $ 200 for family cell phones and $ 120 for cable per month, but water, the most precious resource on earth, should essentially cost next to nothing. This is in particular ironic in a State like California which is by nature an arid State with a fragile ecosystems which was never meant to carry so many people.
37
@Tom Mix
Agree. And we never had the water necessary to support a crop like cotton which uses a lot of water. Worse yet, it is inferior hopsacking quality cotton, not competitive with cotton grown in Florida or India. We have been using water from the Colorado River to support our agriculture in certain regions; that is now a problem for Colorado. Minnesota has stated they will not sell water to CA, nor allow a pipeline to be built. Oregon does not share water with CA. I grew up in the Central Valley where there were lots of farms; now the land is sinking due to excessive use of water in farming and large developments due to the drought. One development in Sacramento cannot get any water hookups.
2
Cotton? Please take a look at numbers. Cotton acreage in California has been on the decline for the last 40 years. The acreage has declined as the price declined and production increased (with less water). The cotton barons moved on to nuts decades ago. Now trees suck a lot more water than cotton.....which can be fallowed. Go ask JG Boswell....they’re growing less cotton.....and a lot more trees.
5
Nothing in this story is limited to California. Small water systems all over the country are in bad shape. These systems were constructed by real estate developers to provide utility service to newly constructed properties for sale. The builder/owner of the utility system had no long term interest in running a utility operation. As a result, the systems are built on the cheap. They then are turned over to private or public operators unqualified to maintain a utility for the long term. Often, the rates they charge are adequate to maintain day to day operations, but not to sustain the reinvestment and upgrades needed to keep the operation going for the long term.
The long term solution is usually takeover by a competent public agency that can make the capital commitments necessary to keep the system going. They may also be taken over by investor owned operations, but, all other things being equal, private ownership is more expensive for the customers as the rates of return awarded shareholders are much higher than the debt expenses of public agencies.
21
This is what the American Society of Civil Engineer's grade of D+
for the US on the infrastructure report card looks like in the real world. People pay far too little for water in this country, and people pay far too little for sewerage in this country; maybe poisonous water and and a reversion to chamber pots is the swift kick in the behind this country needs to stop neglecting our infrastructure.; collapsing bridges don't seem to have done the trick.
14
@Alexander - :)) I live alone in a small one-bedroom apartment and my water bill this month is $167. Yours? Seattle has some of the cleanest water in the country but I pay about 4 times as much as they do in Fresno.
3
Tom Harrison,
You are correct, we pay about $48/month and we get a water quality report at least annually.
“Decades of neglect” applies to much of our public infrastructure. We are relying on the generosity and foresight of previous generations instead of paying it forward for our children.
36
If Ms Moralez is spending $150 a month on bottled water, she needs to get a standard reusable 5 gallon jug and fill it up at a grocery store water machine. I have unpalatable but sanitary well water and buy water for drinking at 25 cents a gallon.
35
@David: my guess is she is buying overpriced plastic water bottles at the supermarket -- the kind that are 24 to a pack -- they can easily cost $4 or more for 24 bottles (16-20 ounces each). That's OK for occasional drinking water, but ridiculous if you are bathing and cooking with it.
10
@David
It could be the grocery store's water is the same that passes through Ms. Moralez' home pipes.
6
I’ve never seen a “grocery store water machine” in CA.
10
Years ago my tap water had to be heavily chlorinated and was unpleasant to drink. I bought a home water distillation unit for under $50 and have been drinking distilled water ever since. It doesn't have much taste, but about 98% of foreign matter (mineerals, biological matter etc.) is gone from the water. It costs me about 70 cents per gallon in electricity. I would urge readers to get a distiller rather than buy bottled water which is usually filtered tap water and makes for more plastic waste.
22
This is one of the disasters lurking underneath the seemingly bland term " aging infrastructure."
Water systems - the equipment, pipes, etc - and the increasing toxification of ground water and reservoirs - are going to kill people, in the way that water based disease was a scourge before public sanitation was a priority. I would add to this the direct risk caused from overburdened trash dump sites.
Anyone for that Mars effort? while we cannot "afford" taking care of the environment, protecting water supplies, taking steps we know are necessary for community welfare?
Most local communities - whether minority urban , semi urban or rural anywhere - do not have the funds to handle this. It is also one more consequence of the loss of middle class jobs and disparity in income levels: the money is concentrated - never in these areas.
24
About the only thing republicans and democrats can agree on is that public infrastructure should be crumbling, poisonous, and beyond repair; it's the great bipartisan unifier of our age. Whether it's the water in Flint, bridges in Minneapolis and Florida, or now the water in California, we welcome all decrepitude, incompetence.\, and danger.
6
@Alexander
Let's be clear; the failure to fund infrastructure is a direct result of republican efforts to demonize fair taxation of corporations and wealthy individuals.
6
@nom de guerre. Let's be clear, California has a democratic supermajority, and has had one for a long time-- you don't get to pin California on Republicans. Republicans are absolutely guilty of infrastructure neglect... Just not in Califora, not that they would have done any different.
2
@nom de guerre
Let's be clear. Democrats passed a stimulus bill costing $0.8 trillion. Their argument was that spending on infrastructure would stimulate the economy. Less than 5% of the money went to infrastructure.
Infrastructure is primarily a local concern. Collecting federal taxes and filtering them through state and local government results in states and local governments reducing their local infrastructure, substituting federal funds, and spending the other money on other projects.
3
07-24-2019: I have stated before and now state again that humankind will not perish from war but from pollution in our atmosphere and in our ground. Slowly, but surely, we are being altered by and will, ultimately, be destroyed by chemicals we literally swim in and breath all day, every day - pre-natally to death. Laws, rules, regulations formed over years of witnessing disasterous outcomes from our exposure to such materials. Laws, rules, regulations meant to help protect and preserve us and the environment from such are being stripped away by those without care and common sense in need of quick profit. Profit payed out at the cost of humankind's future health and long-term survival. And please do not forget about our co-inhabitants ...
16
@Dr. Moria Saloni
You sadly summarize where we are as the species of destruction, and our likely future.
2
Move to Wisconsin and Minnesota, Illinois and Michigan while you still have the chance, people, before we close our borders. Think water wars aren't coming? Think again. Thirty, forty years from now, I'll be gone, but many of you or your posterity will be here. What happens when too much demand chases too few resources? I'm not talking about opportunistic capitalism here! Think about what's happening outside of California in the desert southwest, what's happening in India, and China. They don't have enough potable water, either, and it's getting worse every year. Where are the folks below the Mason Dixon line going to move when the temperatures cannot sustain animal or plant life, let alone human life, and those water supplies dry up like the Gobi Desert?
50
@Jan N, move to Michigan? Have you ever heard of the city of Flint, Michigan? The answer is infrastructure improvement, something trump keeps touting every week, it seems.
It will be amusing, in a way, to see climate refugees from one state, refused asylum in another state, while Texas builds a wall to keep out Californians, and tornadoes care nothing about our politics. Trump and his oligarch strata-level wealthy in any state will be able to lay their own clean, filtered water systems with their millions. I wonder if trump's cult followers will guard his compound from the rest of us?
We will soon see how United these states really are.
9
@Jan N
after FoxConn ships all of Lake Michigan to China, and the only potable water will come from Nestle, then nowhere will have sustainable living.
6
Governments need to start focusing on infastructure and the needs of citizen over populus issues. This is happening everywhere. Illegal and high levels of immigration and other non pressing issues are taking up everyone's time and attention, budget and outdated, damaged infastructure systems build before today's increased population and climate change issues are being ignored. Good government should be able to deal with necessary progressive issues and infastructure. I really wonder why infastructure is what's being ignored and given last priority. Perhaps we need to stop ignoring the demands of the far right and far left and start focusing on what's real and what matters. We are creating a third world and its time elected leaders started doing something about it.
8
@Una, improving "infrastructure" isn't going to increase the supply of drinkable water when there are too many people sucking up what's available with their thirsty mouths along with unsustainable agricultural practices and lifestyles (half hour showers, massive swimming pools, fountains, uncaptured rain water, etc.)
16
@Una Our leaders are not happy with merely creating a third world in California, they are importing it wholesale across the southern border into our sanctuary state. The last thing California needs is more people, but try telling that to the progressives who rule us.
2
I live in a city that I believe has potable water. It just doesn't taste good to me. So I haul six one-gallon glass jugs to the local grocery store to fill with filtered water that they sell through a reverse osmosis machine. It makes me feel better that more chemicals are being extracted from it and it tastes better to me so I drink more water. I hardly ever drink anything but water so taste is important to me. The cost is 40 cents per gallon. The glass jugs are ones that originally had apple cider in them so they were essentially free to me.
I will never support bottled water companies. It's highway robbery. And those single-use plastic jugs are clogging up our earth and seas. And I question whether chemicals in plastic leach into the water. Who wants that? Drinking out of glass is much safer.
Please, please don't buy water in single-use plastic jugs. We've got to stop our overconsumption of plastic and boycotting water in plastic is a good place to start.
101
A caution: I used grocery store bulk filtered water for several years after moving to a region where the water looks, smells and tastes great, but is treated with chloramine, which apparently mutates to something my stomach cannot tolerate. After 4 years of feeling ‘ok, but just not healthy’, I realized that water is not just water. It is the source of essential trace minerals and nutrients that the filtration system was filtering out and not replacing. Switching to bottled spring water solved all the problems. I cringe and curse the water utility every time I open a bottle, but don’t know of another solution.
If anyone does, I will try it!
8
@0101101 I was concerned that the filtering removed minerals so I am conscientious to eat sea salt. Sea salt contains many trace minerals. And it tastes great too. I use Celtic Sea Salt and love it.
4
@expat Thanks- I will try that.
1
Invest in companies that provide water infrastructure, b/c we are going to need it.
7
Ms. Moralez's final statement says it all. There's nothing specifically Democratic or Republican about it, despite all the vitriolic comments about illegal immigrants, Newsom, Hispanics, etc.
3
California is one of the greatest examples of why Trump will be re-elected next year.
10
I hope the Sativa district is audited, and if any fraud or embezzlement is found, those involved should be prosecuted.
6
Rented a VRBO in Prunedale (central valley) a couple of years ago. The place came with carboys of water and a water cooler. In town there were water dispensing machines and LINES of people to get potable water. Guess the almonds and artichokes got all the good stuff from the formerly pristine aquifer.
25
Prunedale is not in the Central Valley. It is in Monterey county which is on the central coast of California. The agriculture issues there are completely different than those in the Central Valley where much of the water is federally controlled.
6
We aren't going to get clean water until the well-to-do (of whole I am one) stop installing reverse osmosis filters and/or having huge bottles of waters dropped off at their homes every week.
In other words, never. Because the people who sell us all these devices aren't going to give up the money they make off us.
13
@KB *of whom I am one.
1
@KB
Didn't notice the mistake until you pointed it out. These are comments made while holding a cup of coffee, so we don't expect perfection. An edit feature though would be nice.
5
Never forget how California environmentalists insisted in the ‘90s that MTBE be used as a fuel additive to reduce smog thus polluting groundwater for generations.
12
And the Trump administration is doing its best to repeal the Clean Water Act. . .
64
The article and many comments seem to reflexively assume that the responsibility/solution to these poorly run water districts isn’t local. It’s part of “infrastructure”, or the product of Democratic incompetence or Republican callousness. Even Trump makes an appearance.
Questions: Why is this anyone’s problem other than those whose water is affected? Why don’t these small water companies manage their systems competently?
Most important: why can’t those being ill-served by their water company bring pressure to bear through their elected representatives?
The article seems to assume size and state oversight is what is needed. I don’t. I suspect what’s lacking is political control. Certainly that was the case in Flint, but here the article is mute on the subject.
Someone decides who runs the water system. Someone answers for water quality and rates. In most of the country, those someones answer to the electorate. Why not here?
19
@James K. Lowden
Because people will ponder their local pro-sports teams for 1,000 hours before they think 10 minutes about the pipes leading to and from their homes. People have taken these systems working for granted and much of the infrastructure is getting so old that water departments barely know of its origins or present condition.
And probably not just a poor community issue either; Los Altos, Ca had an e-coli outbreak this decade and about a year later Mercer Island (a affluent Seattle bedroom community) experienced the same.
8
It's one more bit of evidence that the Blue State yuppie paradises are for the svelte ones and not at all for the lower classes.
It's also one more answer to the Blue State yuppie bafflement: why would anybody vote for Trump, instead of a Blue State yuppie star?
9
@alyosha
Do you really believe Trump cares about water issues in small towns and actually fixes them, especially after his unprecedented attacks on the EPA and across the federal government?
Did you bother reading the article where it says overwhelmingly Democratic LOS ANGELES COUNTY jumped in to fix the problem? Read up on all LA is doing for the Sativa water district, happily paid for by my taxes and water payments.
https://www.sativawd.com
Meanwhile, Trump-loving West Virginia ranks near the bottom on multiple rankings:
Best place to live - #43
https://www.wdtv.com/content/news/West-Virginia-ranks-in-Best-State-to-Live-report-511145661.html
Poorest state of the country:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wowktv.com/news/west-virginia/west-virginia-ranked-poorest-state-in-country/amp/
Worst state for millennials:
https://www.wowktv.com/news/west-virginia/study-names-west-virginia-2019s-worst-state-for-millennials/amp/
Those are just the first three that jumped out of many in a search for “West Virginia rankings”. What’s Trump doing to make West Virginia “great again”, besides keeping it white? As the Bible says,
“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?” Matthew 7:3
13
....for the life of me I don't understand why we cant clean out a few pipelines and have midwest farmers construct sanitary catch basins and ship rainwater to the west coast. The Romans did it!
18
I knew it would be inevitable that California would deteriorate to a quasi-third world status, with extremely wealthy areas and everyone else eking out an existence where even the basics would be hard to come by. I didn't expect it to happen in 2019 though.
41
@Ed So, you mean, to the level that Virginia has been at for decades?
11
@Ed
In other words, catching up with Virginia . . .
25
@Ed
Ha! Thanks for the laugh. Good way to start my morning.
7
But our great leader assured us that we have the cleanest most purest water in the whole wide world. The forgotten people should drink deeply.
15
I would recommend also looking at water closer to home in Long Beach, NY. Recently there was a boil water order because of E. coli and now residents are ill due to the high levels of chlorine. The water has been running dark brown for years, with chunks of debris and metal. This is in Nassau county with some of the highest property taxes in this country and there still isn’t clean water. It’s appalling.
106
There are simply certain problems that governments cannot solve. Too many folks in an area that is a desert in many respects. Unincorporated municipalities is a good term for an area that most likely hints of chaos. This is third world stuff that one finds among very rich folks having the best spots. We will find much stealing of public money here also. Very sad!
36
@WSF
Fracking is the cause. When the corrupt GOP allowed them to frack and crack the stone God put there to hold the ground up now you got dirt seeping into the wells. You GOP will blame every thing under the sun but not your toxic policies. Very sad.
35
@WSF
"There are simply certain problems that governments cannot solve." That is considered the vilest heresy by many, to whom government, especially that in Washington, is a thing to bow to and worship.
3
@D.j.j.k.
You know, because Democrats would rather buy oil from Third World thugs, or industrialize vast swathes of land for wind and solar farms.
6
This will be the story of our Federal Government's infrastructure after one term of Trump, judging by the ethics investigations, mismanagement and outright corruption being identified in departments like the EPA, Education, and the Interior. Americans don't seem to realize that good government--competent, ethical--is vital to a functioning democracy and economy. For an economy like ours, complex, interconnected, dominated by huge corporations--you need a big, honest, competent organization to protect the lives and well being of our citizens and residents. If our infrastructure is being given a D today by our engineering experts, it is only a matter of time before our economy, like Rome's, suffers huge declines taking us all with it.
47
@Concerned Citizen The Trump administration rolled back decades of the Clean Water Act, The Trump EPA allows use of controversial pesticides EPA won't ban pesticides harmful to children and bees. 83 Environmental rules being rolled back under Trump. This dose and will effect our water, air and soil in a negative way.
57
@Concerned Citizen
I believe the meaning here was that Trump is not interested in infrastructure issues (that smacks of evil socialism) and when you appoint someone who supports environmental degradation to run the EPA, you’ve got even bigger problems. There was nothing about your buddy causing it.
4
@Jayne Unfortunately we do not have the money or the infrastructure or the land to accommodate the thousands of immigrants that come into California each year. I am not a Trump supporter, but I am a Californian and I see that we have to set stronger controls on immigration to have a sustainable California.
8
Just another example of the long term effect of Republican’s misguided fiscal and tax policies.
14
California has long been controlled by the Democrats, so we can't blame the Repubs for this. It's not Kansas :)
22
@Evangelist For Reality: California has been run by Democrats for many years now.
13
@Concerned Citizen Evangelist for Reality...is that supposed to be a joke?
2
There are no doubt many cities throughout the US affected by lead in the water..perhaps bordering the minimum amounts. But, never the less, I never drink water from the tap. And, this is America...
3
California has the state tax dollars to fix these water supply problems. The big question is why they have been allowed to persist for so many decades.
33
@Richard Winchester: re-read the article.
There are no problems in Beverly Hills or Bel Air or Santa Monica.
The problems are ALL in poor districts filled with minorities and service workers.
I thought California had BILLIONS in tax surpluses.....
16
The deeper problem here is not the pollution of our water, but the pollution of our politics. Infinite resources for war and political payback, struggling for every penny for the necessities of life.
175
@Steve's Weave - Green Classifieds Putting a public utility in the hands of a private company is step number one in being sure it will fail while being financially raped.
54
@grmadragon ~ I would have agreed with you at one time, but now I trust a private company to do better than a municipality. A private company, like Aqua America, has experience and resources to do the right thing, and shareholders will hold them accountable. Check them out; I think you'll be impressed .
1
@grmadragon
Exactly. The privatization of water has led to innumerable tragedies around the world, most keenly in poor areas. Price-gouging, cutting off of water supplies, discrimination among customers... All the predictable. Thanks for your addition.
11
Perhaps instead of giving money to undocumented immigrants and constantly seeing the Trump administration they should put some of that money into the needs of their taxpayers most basic needs. Where is all the tax money from one of the highest taxed states going?
21
To subsidize tax poor Republican states?
13
Incorrect guess. California tax transfers are primarily in the form of SS and Medicare. Nothing to do with water districts in-state
3
@Concerned Citizen California tax dollars are used to support all the lazy freeloaders receiving welfare (read: farm subsidies) in Anywheresville, Kansas, and Anywheresville, Oklahoma, and Anywheresville, Louisiana.
6
Too funny!
Governor Newsome is so busy providing free health care to millions of illegal aliens with hundreds of millions of citizens tax money, he doesn’t have time to bother providing drinkable water.
Isn’t drinkable water a “ human right?”
Not in California!
62
@William Rodham Gov. Newsom is a sad businessman who hopes he's handsome enough to fool the DNC into giving him bigger and better roles on the national stage.
All you have to do is look at how he ran San Fransisco. That's all he plans to do for the state - give the wealthy everything and anything they want, and let the poor live and die in the streets and subways, just like they do in SF.
8
@William Rodham, Governor Newsom proposed a new tax to develop more water resources specifically aimed at production of water in low income communities. It was announced 2 weeks ago. I don’t necessarily agree with how this tax works, but he is attempting to finance a fix and addressing the issue.
As others have commented here, California deserves to receive a bigger slice of the federal pie as we pay more to the federal government than we receive in benefits.
15