Why would they expect the federal government to pay for their mistakes and lack of quick response? It is likely that the orthophosphate addition will work as it did in Washington about 15 years ago.
1
So if the water was acidic for sometime and corroded the joints and released lead i
from the water company joints, what about the pipes in the people's houses? Have these pipes developed leaks, and is mold beginning to grow inside the walls of these homes? That would be a huge health problem...Asthma, bronchitis, COPD, cancers, lymphoma...
1
Unless I'm misunderstanding something, these two statements appear to contradict each other.
"Then in 2016, the chemical seemed to stop working.
Here is what appeared to have happened, according to interviews and public records: The year before, the city had tinkered with the water, increasing its acidity to tamp down on possible carcinogens."
and
"It was around the time that the watershed agency was mired in scandal that acidity levels started increasing, for reasons that remain unclear. Acidity levels were in safe territory until 2015, when a sharp acceleration corroded pipes, leading to lead leaching."
So did acidity levels increase in 2015 because the city tinkered with them, or due to some unknown reason?
1
@Devyn Osborne - the NJ DEP issued violations for, among other things, exceedence of standards for carcinogens known as "disinfection byproducts": tribal-halo methanes and Haloacetic Acids, see:
https://www9.state.nj.us/DEP_WaterWatch_public/JSP/Violations.jsp?tinwsys=127
My understanding is that the City made changes to treatment system to address those violations, which acidified the water, leading to the lead problem.
1
Cory Booker, where are you?
1
The headline “a Boss with a Criminal Past” is offensive. It makes it sound like the Federal Bureau of Prisons is responsible for the water crisis in Newark and also reinforces the negative stereotype that ex-offenders are unemployable. The criminal record is not the problem with the job performance of the acting director of the Newark Water Dept. If Mr. Adeem had a degree in engineering or chemistry, some of these problems might have been avoided. The failure to appoint a qualified person to head up the water dept is clearly the fault of Mayor Baraka.
9
It is human to err.
All of us have both strengths and limitations;
the human condition.
Metal fatigue is also a reality!
It is “political” to lie.
To pervert facts.
To promote historical amnesia.
To transmute facts to fictions. To fantasies. To alt-facts.
To deny.
To choose to be willfully blind.
Willfully deaf.
Willfully indifferent.
Seemingly “ignorant.”
Willfully personally unaccountable!
It is menschlich to “Fail better.” Choices.
“It was around the time that the watershed agency was mired in scandal that acidity levels started increasing, for reasons that remain unclear. Acidity levels were in safe territory until 2015, when a sharp acceleration corroded pipes, leading to lead leaching.”
What was done differently to cause the sudden lead leaching in 2015? Who was in charge? There must be records to investigate and expose! We know what happened in Flint. Somebody tried to save a few bucks. Follow the money.
4
@Joel H "Newark officials now say that some water testing records were lost during this tumultuous period in the city’s water stewardship." Lost or destroyed?
4
Questionable actions?
2
This long article covers the science barely, if you read very close it appears to be an acidity problem that is being addressed with orthophosphate but might take six months to work. A variation on the Flint theme where the primary treatment chemical was not used when the water source was changed and the acidity increased .
Are we becoming post truth science illiterates?
Looks like we can’t depend on engineers to save us from a predisposition to ignore science.
Here in Chicago we have lead service lines as well. I hope our water engineers are keeping the acidity and additives to our water at proper levels. The Newark situation should be explained in short form so all will know what’s
going on with the water there at the present moment.
10
Meanwhile, back at the NJ ranch, Newark voted to give its council member and mayor substantial raises. Over the course of the past two years, NJ taxpayers have showered an additional quarter billion on already bloated and failing schools in Newark. NJ Dems, who control the Legislature, added hundreds of millions of “Democratic priorities”, aka pork, to the budget, including beefing up spending on Planned Parenthood by tens of millions and funding zoos and providing handouts to urban (Democratic) towns. The Dems bloated spending by 12% in two short years and have jacked up taxes hundreds of times in the 18 years they've controlled Trenton.
And, yet, not one of the Democrats, the Party of the people, thought that preventing Newark from poisoning its residents was a “priority”.
You can try to shift the blame if you like, by this system is run by the City of Newark (which also got tens of millions in Green Acres funds to “preserve” its watershed properties which were never in any danger of being developed). And, in Newark, doing the unsexy work of fixing pipes is secondary to enriching your friends at public expense. (See e.g Sharpe James)
Add to the list of fat cats feasting on taxpayer funds politically potent unions which wax rich on taxpayer dollars doing public projects for the “prevailing wage”.
And you know what? Almost to a person, the problems are Democrats. Who could have guessed?
15
1. This wouldn’t have happened in Westfield NJ, 13 miles from Newark and a world away. The big difference? A mostly black community vs. a mostly white community. The blame goes to local and state government.
2. When state and local governments don’t want to raise taxes to pay for crumbling roads, bridges, pipes, and transportation hubs (our third world airports and train stations) then don’t expect to raise my federal taxes to bail you out of the mess.
3. To poison children with lead is criminal and government officials should end up in jail.
5
Jumping to Flint, MI for just a moment...a little irony...who knew that Rick Snyder's middle name is Leadwater...Richard Leadwater Snyder...you can't make this stuff up.
On another note, why isn't Newark, and as Flint should be doing, distributing gallon jugs of water to reduce the plastic population problem. One tragedy begets another.
Of course, people are making this political; Newark with it's democratic administration but Obama didn't do nearly enough...and I'm a registered democrat.
4
Perhaps Sen. Booker of the doomed presidential campaign should concentrate on getting safe drinking water to the people of Newark, cleaning up the city government which has been corrupt for decades, and drop the campaign. The mayor of Newark should resign if he had any conscience, and the NJ governor should appoint a caretaker until safe water flows through the taps.
15
Well, this takes care of Senator Booker’s pseudo pious platform for maybe presidential candidate.
13
As a former resident of New Jersey, a Professional Engineer and a strong supporter of democracy, I am sickened by what has been done to the people of Newark. They need serious help, not PUR filters and bottled water.
Above all, Newark needs competent leadership. Mayor Baraka has proved to be incapable of providing that. I am not a partisan person, but I see no hope that NJ Democrats will remove him or prevent his re-election. I have therefore urged the NJGOP to run a Republican candidate for Newark Mayor and pledged my personal support, financial and otherwise, if they do so.
19
I think I hear Mr. Booker's political career dribbling away drop by drop.
BTW: Where did all the money go from all the money that the Facebook founder gave to improve public schools ?
17
“Consultants!”
2
More fine leadership from NJ Democrats. I’m sure they’re fully vested in gender politics, ensuring that schools have multi-gender restrooms and colleges & universities within the state are scrapping binary gender choices on all systems. I’m confident they’re spending as much as possible supporting illegal aliens. No doubt they’re strenuously working on climate change.
But they’ve done nothing to ensure they’re not poisoning people daily. Flint’s lead problem has been known for years. Every east coast city has now had years to work on identifying lead problems. Instead, they chose to ignore them for politically correct and trendy political opportunities; shame on all of them
17
We can complain about past administrations. We can complain about current administrations. But infrastructure upgrades to our potable water transmission system is an issue that affects the Nation and recently was listed as one of the top 10 issues by the American Water Works Association. We have a Democratic governor who was a successful financial executive elected to bring business finance solutions to New Jersey and to get things done (instead of perennially running for higher office.) Its time for Governor Murphy to do what Governor Wolf just did to solve issues at Bucks County water supply by appropriating money to fix Newark's decrepit water transmission issues.
9
Very fine and informative reporting by all. This article explains a lot. Heh, I cycle through parts of Newark. That part is absolutely beautiful. And I bring my own water.
The elephant in the room, as always these days, is trump. Trump vilifies our cities, and we become outraged at him for doing that. But Newark doesn't need to provide trump evidence for his anti-city rants:
“There clearly has been a systemic failure,” said Erik Olson, a senior director at the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group that has sued the city over the lead levels. “Residents of Newark are the ones harmed by the top-to-bottom failures of government.”
And Essex County has some of the highest taxes in the nation. So to fix Newark's problem, they'll have to raise those taxes even more. But voters now know that the taxes are raised by a corrupt government.
Given Newark's corrupt "past", its governmental recalcitrance simply can't be ignored. Dumping more money into that city to try to fix its bad water is no guarantee that the pipes will be fixed.
I don't know *who's* going to win the 2020 presidential election; I'll vote Dem, but trump just scored some mighty big points with this horrible news from Newark.
5
Absolute nonsense. The elephant in the room is not Trump, it is the failure of local politicians to do their jobs. They should be doing more to solve these problems and citizens should stop blaming the federal government for everything that their local politicians have failed to correctly handle.
23
The “elephant in the room” is not Trump! The “elephant in the room” is the Democratic Machine that has ruled Newark for more than 65 years that tolerates incompetence and corruption!
5
I would have liked to know which of the 3 filters worked and which other 2 did not.
7
@S-Dawg Me too. Just how much more crack investigative reporting would have been required to provide that useful tidbit??
1
My Fault, Your Fault . Nobody's fault, How Does this happen in the U.S.A in 2019? Was Flint the begining of more to come? I hear people say "The Greatest Country in The World" when speaking about the U.S. So then how do things like this keep happening? With our infrastructure and water are we becoming a Third world Country on Steroids? Too many of our Elected Officials are looking out for their Donors interests and not rhe rank and file voters.
7
How does this happen? It happens because we have neglected infrastructure for the past 50 years. We continue to spend on all sorts of trendy things instead of keeping basic infrastructure sound and functioning so that people can build lives off of the communities that they live in.
11
As a professional civil engineer and a former public works director, I have a little experience with issues like this. First off, water pipes aren't "sexy". Given a choice between spending money on replacing water pipes or building a new stadium, the stadium will win every time. Pipes are underground, out of sight out of mind. No politician will run on "replacing the water pipes". So it's a tough sell for a PW director to convince an elected body to spend the money to replace something that no one will see. As a result, our infrastructure, especially our underground infrastructure everywhere in the Country is ignored until we have a Flint or Newark. Add in a little toxic brew like racism, corruption and macho electeds who want to spend less and give tax cuts and you get the predicted result.
22
Very correct except for the tax cuts observation. Tax cuts lead to growing revenues over time. Politicians do not focus on the right things though until the crisis hits. You are correct - pipes are not sexy until people realize their health is being compromised by what they have chosen to ignore. Also from a fellow PE and metallurgist - trust me, nobody should be drinking from lead pipes.
5
@Julia Ellegood....which is probably why you were just the P.W. director. The end result is 'clean and safe water', the pipes are only the means to achieve this result and a goal which transcends race and even politics. Labor unions and insider purchases are a byword in Newark.
3
@Julia Ellegood
Well, as a public works director you should recognize that the issue of lead is not related to water systems' infrastructure - most all of their water mains are made of cast iron or ductile iron.
The lead is a problem in the homes - the service line from the main and the interior plumbing. And, it is mostly contained to single or small multi-family homes built pre-1960's. Large apartment buildings have copper pipes. New homes have copper or PVC piping.
Responsible water utilities, that is most every system in the country, takes the proper measures to protect homeowners by using orthophosphates as an additive to water so lead pipes will have a coating. This prevents the lead from leaching in to the drinking water (This is where Newark and Flint failed miserably). And, even when some does leach, usually it is minimal, it can be addressed by flushing the water (running the tap) for from 5-10 seconds or up to 30 minutes, as needed.
This lead 'crisis' is a homeowner issue, mostly contained to older housing stock in older cities and towns. Simple fixes of running the water or putting in a filtration system can address it 90% or more of the time. In extremes, and at a cost of $5K to $20K to the homeowner, service lines can be replaced.
Alleged environmentalist, such as the NRDC, are ginning up hysteria on this topic, as well as on wastewater treatment, since they benefit from making these issues part of their agenda.
2
Has former Newark mayor and Senator Cory Booker (D-Thrace) returned to form and blame.... Trump?
14
All this plastic! How irresponsible!!
adding a 2nd problem to a 1st one!
Instead of a 24-pack of small bottles, at least make it larger (still portable) containers!
10
I wonder where the next infrastructure time bomb will go off, and what it will be--water, bridge, gas pipeline, food, electricity....
2
Just 100 miles north!
Portland water providers, top officials at the local and state drinking water offices have known about elevated lead in water for decades, while hiding the inconvenient truth from the people (you can't see, smell or taste dissolved lead in water)
2
Business as usual in Democratic controlled cities and states. Incompetent management, patronage and complete contempt for citizens since they will only vote for Democrats.
When describing the criminal background of Mr. Adeem (Baraka elevated to temporary head of water dept.) for cocaine sale, why did the authors choose to describe the sake as 5 kilograms since the basic measure used in the US not metric? 5 kilograms is = to 11 pounds of cocaine, not exactly personal use. Which begs the question why characterize it in metric terms, to soften perceptions on the gravity of the offense? So why was this clown only given 4 years in jail? Why is there someone without a science or engineering background in such a critical position...before and after problem? Look, I”
Km sure Mr. Adeem deserves redemption, and he probably has achieved that, but his lack of science/engineering background when hired means other more competent individuals were not 5here to question or be aware of issues like water acidity.
11
The responsibility for Flint, MI's water crisis rests squarely on the shoulders of the then governor, a Republican. Please look before you leap with misleading (at best) or false comments. They are not helpful.
3
@Ace Because the "Metric" system is the international system (literally), which is used exclusively by the US military, and little kids in US are learning it. Surely any grownup reading the NY Times should be as capable as little kids are.
1
@Ace
Since 1975 all Flint mayors were Democrats.
4
Why does this article not report that all these officials are Democrats? You can bet that if they were Republicans, that fact would be highlighted in the first prargraph.
9
The Mayor blames the Feds for not paying to replace the old lead pipes. The same mayor lies to his constituants and deflects blame. The Mayor appoints a crony who knows nothing about management or engineering to head up the Water dept. The prior commission on water purity dissolves under charges of corruption and incompetence. Inept and dishonest leadership will do it every time. Sounds a lot like Trump's incendiary description of Baltimore, doesn't it?
8
@fourteenwest. And baltimore has great water from a dept of public works run by a professional engineer.
The problem in newark is complicated. It is easy to prevent lead leaching by itself. It is difficult to prevent lead leaching while disinfecting the water while avoiding illegal concentrations of disinfection byproducts. A small change in anything can change water chemistry. If you think you understand the problem, you don't.
1
@etaeng...Wait a second. Baltimore has great water because a PE runs the show? Presumably she understands the problems to be overcome to have great water? But, if she understands the problems, she doesn't? So, is Baltimore's "great water" just a fluke?
3
I have heard that other cities in NJ also have unacceptable lead levels. Would the NYTimes print a list, please?
6
@Jan The water reservoir providing Newark's water also provides water for a number of other N.J. towns. I read the monthly water quality analysis for one and the quality was very high; meaning Newark's should be too. You can find a link to the water reservoir and the towns it serves if you look for it.
2
This is outraging. Appointing a.clearly incompetent person to run this department and assuring the public that the water is safe is on par with Bridgegate. I am surprised this mayor has not stepped down to say the least. It’s criminal!
6
Another Democrat run city that has failed their citizens for decades. We can now add Newark to Baltimore, Detroit, LA, Chicago just to name a few. Why these hapless citizens keep voting the same people into office is a mystery to me. I remember during the presidential campaign when Trump asked a black audience, "What do you have to lose??" They should've given him a chance. Black unemployment levels are at their lowest levels EVER!! Hate him like most of the Times readers but Trump gets results.
Democrats have not solved the problems that these poor people have endured for DECADES and have actually made things worse in many cases. Look at their crime rates, their failing schools, poisoned water, homelessness, deteriorating roads and bridges. Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and never getting the result you want.
12
@Barbara Gibbes
But, um, whether blacks voted for him or not, Trump got his chance, didn't he? No, Democrats are far from perfect, but how are we *really* doing right now? And let's not forget that the US flagship for lead poisoning is still Flint, MI--a city and state under... a Republican administration.
4
@Barbara Gibbes
What has Trump done to improve our infrastructure (despite his campaign promises)?
2
Is Newark the same as Flint? it is not a Newark problem or a Flint problem it is a NATIONAL problem. Flint's crisis was imposed by an appointed emergency financial manager by a white governor with callous disregard for poor Michiganders especially Black and Latinx, making it even more outrageous. And, just miles from Flint, Nestle just got approval to double its extraction and is bottling Michigan aquifer water for nothing. However both Newark and Flint stem from Federal priorities for the 800 military bases, international regime change and war weapons, fighting against migrants so private prison bottom lines get fat, maximizing profits instead of people's lives. Time to fight for a new deal putting workers and poor first. Replace all the pipes, now.
2
@cheryl ..... 'black and latinx' homeowners failed to replace their lead pipes with copper ones as specified in the codes and this is the result. Subsidizing houses for poor people is a noble idea, but if they can't maintain them, you'll have repeated 'disasters'.
3
For the past two decades, Newark has been turning around with a world-class Performing Arts Center and an exciting sports arena, dynamic repurposing of older buildings, the growth of a center of educational excellence, and new business such as audible.com as well as the expansion is Prudential Insurance. This is a tragic black eye for the city, but it is fixable if the will is there. Yes, the majority of the population is people of color, but there is a rainbow of skin tones throughout the population - and what should that matter? These are people, mostly American citizens, who need and deserve what every other American resident has or should have. Let's get honest and let's get going on a solution first; worry about blaming later.
5
@CP Newark has twice the unemployment and poverty rates of the rest of the U.S. What have the 'performing arts center' and 'exciting sports arena' done to lower them. Cherry picking is not allowed!
5
@CP: Yes, evidently political correctness doesn't fix the pipes. The issue that this disturbing article raises actually counters your advice, "Let's get honest and let's get going on a solution first." There is little evidence that the city has the honesty and tools to get going on a solution.
Yes, let's get honest. There is a consequence to the honesty. City government deflects that consequence, hence the difficulty to getting honest.
2
@Cali Sol...Does dynamic repurposing of older buildings count? What about a center of educational excellence? New businesses? Is "get going on a solution first" a negative? Sour grapes are not allowed!
1
I grew up in Newark, where you did not need 6 degrees of separation to see the utter corruption in the city government. I feel sorry for Corry Booker, you can't serve as mayor and not be contaminated by the corruption in every aspect of Newark's government and school system. The school system spends more per capita than most districts in NJ, and has the worst results. Only the Catholic schools have succeeded in Newark. The water is only a symptom of something very very wrong in Newark.
9
@CCL
Why do you keep electing Democrats??? For decades they have been stealing from you with disastrous results. Look at these Democrat run cities. They have rampant crime, failing schools, corrupt politicians, poisoned water, crumbling infrastructures.
Granted Republicans are no angels but give them a chance. Its better than doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.
7
@Barbara Gibbes
...don't forget Kansas, Republicans have their own incompetence as well as cronyism as the Democrats. Just look at your president.
@Carol
My president is doing just fine.
2
I grew up in Newark, where you did not need 6 degrees of separation to see the utter corruption in the city government. I feel sorry for Corry Booker, you can't serve as mayor and not be contaminated by the corruption in every aspect of Newark's government and school system. The school system spends more per capita than most districts in NJ, and has the worst results. Only the Catholic schools have succeeded in Newark. The water is only a symptom of something very very wrong in Newark.
2
Clean water is essential to life! Ingesting lead is ingesting poison. It's obvious, but if it is so obvious why is it such a low priority on local, state and federal govermental levels? It doesn't take a genius, stable or not, to know this should be the highest priority on all levels of government.
Even Richard Nixon, the scoundrel that he was, recognized this fact and created the Environmental Protection Agency. Because he knew our environment, is not and should never be a political partisian issue, because it affects everyone. Why doesn't our current administration recognize these simple facts? Why are they sytematicaly dismantleing the EPA?
Because, in my opinion, Republican leadership believes the money needed to correct these problems is better used to support their Donor Class. They also think these problems affect low income citizens of color the most, thus it is a Democratic problem, and not theirs. Short sighted thinking leads to long term problems, for everyone. Another obvious fact, the Republicans choose to ignore.
7
@Paul Piluso
So an article about the incompetence and contempt the Democrats in power in Newark have for their citizens is really about the mean old Republicans. I bet the Koch’s have something to do with this! Democrats are so blinded by their hate of Republicans that they can’t even see or think straight.
5
@Ace Interesting Ace,
Hey Ace, I guess Chris Christie, should be absolved of any complicity in this issue. I clearly stated local, state and federal levels of government looked at this issue as a low priority. When it should be the highest priority on all levels of government. Our Environment is a National and World wide issue. If not addressed will be a problem now and in the future, in a neighborhood near you, sooner than later. Yes, both Democrats and Republicans are to blame, but it is our current Federal Administration that is overtly complicit in ignoring these issues.
1
@Ace
You're right. The Koch's do have something to do with this. Their persistent campaign to cut federal revenues has drastically effected our ability to address crucial infrastructure issues.
1
The picture shows that the residence of Newark were given "PUR" water filters that have to be screwed on to the kitchen water faucet. To get pure water you have to turn on the little lever on the side of the filter. In addition, the internal filters have to be changed regularly. Were the residence of Newark given clear instruction on how to use this filter? Were they given extra filters and told to change them every two months?
8
Why wasn’t there a mention of the city giving out water that is past the “best by” date on waters? Why was there no mention of the effects of lead and what age groups it could have targeted and could be targeting now? There should overall be more information. I am disappointedly that there is no more information.
2
Finger pointing is unproductive at this point. What's needed is a plan and teamwork.
5
@E. SmiNo, finger pointing is important to establish if bad behaviors (crimes) are involved. Otherwise there is no accountability and no change.
5
@E. Smith and @Phyllis Sidney, you are both right. The humans who caused the problem must accept responsibility; the physical issues have apparently been found, and must be remediated immediately whether or not the perpetrators have yet been identified. It's about people; their lives and health are the priorities.
3
@E. Smith and @Phyllis Sidney, you are both right. The humans who caused the problem must accept responsibility; the physical issues have apparently been found, and must be remediated immediately whether or not the perpetrators have yet been identified. It's about people; their lives and health are the priorities.
It is unfortunate that honest Essex County, NJ politicians are all but impossible to find.
Essex consists of a group of upper- and upper-middle-class regions surrounding a belt of middle- and middle-lower predominantly white (the lower belt including many 2nd-5th generation all-of-European-American ethnics) and current industry (pharmaceuticals/home-industrial chemicals), surrounding Newark, where people’s skins tend to be darker, a legacy of post-WW II “white flight” to then-new outer ring and unjust support for the wealthy, caused by the riots of the 1960s, and their aftermath: wholesale destruction of what homes there were for the poor on the black/white border of the old North Ward of the city, and collapse of the pre-war/wartime industrial jobs center between Newark Bay, “the Ironbound” -streets lined on both sides by foreboding unbroken dark red-brick factory walls to the curb, laced with miles of long-disused rail, and the remains of what was once a thriving downtown...
An urban rust-belt core.
Outside of its first county executive in the late 80s-early 90s, burned out fighting of one of the last few poor big city, and wealthy county machines, it has had little honest leadership.
I suspect Essex continues to be one of the few spots in BosWash where most who enter high office under clouds of confetti leave in steel bracelets.
It is a shambles of a system more than half a century old, surviving on raw greed, worthy of the official motto “Abandon hope ye who enter.”
2
"Mayor Ras Baraka of Newark made a number of unexpected decisions.
He mailed a brochure to all city residents assuring them that “the quality of water meets all federal and state standards.”
He declared the water safe and then condemned, in capital letters on the city’s website, “outrageously false statements” to the contrary."
This shocks. This is nothing less than incompetence at best. It's more like criminal intent.
Why isn't this man arrested? Knowingly harming people, including children, cannot be acceptable in a civil society.
17
New York City's water which used to be the best in the world tastes strange now, like plastic. They recently upgraded treatment from the Croton System. I wonder if it is still healthy to drink. What we know is you can't trust the government.
4
I'm disappointed that the gentleman running the water department is dismissed as obviously incompetent and corrupt simply because he previously had a criminal conviction. And then he's disparaged further for not having a college degree. (Note--people with drug convictions are generally denied financial aid for college)
It seems that, even knowing the ways in which our justice system and our higher education system are systematically biased against people of color and people who are less privileged, we're still far too quick to judge people solely by the marks they bear from these biased systems. The man in question also apparently had experience in the department. Was he really a wholly unqualified choice for the job?
4
He is not unqualified because he lacks (any) college degree. He is unqualified to lead the Water Department because he is not an engineer with specific expertise in municipal water supply management. It is possible, though difficult, to become an engineer without formal academic training.
4
@Luke...I have dealt with a number of college educated engineers with P.E. credentials who couldn't engineer a mouse trap let alone manage a water tap. Government is full of these types. In fact, the vast majority of municipal water systems are run and managed by "uneducated" rubes. Maybe fewer engineers in the EPA, the NJDEQ and Newark would have yielded better results.
@Albert Edmud Thank you for your opinion, but I see no rational basis for it. I've been a P.E. for 47 years, practicing in and out of the federal government, and have never met a PE who was less than competent. That is because the licensing requires passing two rigorous examinations plus continued education. Albert, please correct me if I'm wrong, but I sense you've never written any of these examinations.
2
And this is the structural and institutional racism you see everyday here in the US. I’ve lived in many countries, but have nowhere seen this dimension of racism.
And yes you may have a law prohibiting racism, but it now happens along economic lines, and is therefore just too natural for most.
All these catastrophic events happen mostly in predominantly black communities. Ever asked why?
2
New Jersey will elect a Republican governor in 2021.
6
And hopefully a Republican Senator. Cory Booker is a failure as a US Senator.
He missed 44% of the votes in the Senate because he is too busy running for President.
4
This is unconscionable. Even worse, where is Phil's Murphy's leadership to seriously address and rectify this? Disgraceful beyond words, but proof of New Jersey's completely broken government.
6
You know who isn't getting their water tested, who isn't eligible for water filters or bottled water? The people living in those tall 1960s era apartment buildings. Do the apartment owners have that much pull that they can avoid being required to test the water, inspect for lead solder In those old fixtures, and remove it?
Probably.
Official tale being told is that lead can't be a problem in tall apartment buildings because like pipes are too heavy to pipe up 20 floors. That may be, but it doesn't say anything about the feed lines to the building and it definitely doesn't say anything about cheap fixtures and cheap lead plumbing solder.
Why is no one looking at this? NY Times? Please?
1
@SD
Lead service lines, pipes and solder is a non-issue in large apartment buildings because most all of them have copper service lines and piping. Lead is almost exclusively concentrated in single to smaller multi-family homes.
3
Too many engineering managers in government lack the credentials necessary for doing their work properly.
People running life-line services in any city should be licensed professional engineers (PEs). In NJ a licensed PE musty have a degree in engineering, pass 2 technical exams to demonstrate technical competence and pass a test on professional ethics. They myst also undergo continuing education courses to renew their licenses. Being a PE should become a necessary (but not sufficient) requirement for any engineering management job.
Water delivery and waster water disposal is an essential part of what environmental engineers do. The education typically consist of a BSc degree softened followed by an M.Sc. It is not something one can wing.
Environmental engineers have saved more lives than doctors. Failure to put them in charge will kill lots of people, slowly.
Can the NYT look into how many of those in charge had the necessary credentials to do their work properly.
11
Amen!! Follow the law and require State Professional Engineers where required. The hidden shame is that the State of New Jersey does not even follow their own law requiring a PE at the State regulatory level overseeing this program. Ask the question, is there any State professional engineer overseeing the program at the Division of Water Supply ? The answer is a resounding no !!
4
@Professor Ice...My little village in fly over country just settled a malpractice law suit with the PE who botched the design of our new EPA/USDA coerced Water Treatment Plant [WTP]. The PE at the State HHS had never seen blueprints for a WTP, but she approved the botched plan anyway - her PE boss signed off on her recommendations. The USDA PE who was supposed to be in charge of oversight of the entire project was a farce. The PEs at the Regional EPA office never showed their faces - sounds like Flint and Newark...The ASCE would have you believe that a PE is worth the paper it is printed on. That ain't necessarily so.
Ironic that in the 19th and early 20th centuries, Newark's water supply was famously superior, so much so that over a dozen breweries flourished there. Bud's still there -- I wonder how they cope with this issue.
4
@Denny
You can be sure that they don't have ancient lead pipes feeding water into their brewery.
1
Drinking water pollution not just a so called development —country —problem to solve by implementation environmental w.h.o. health programs ,cynically enough industrial 2.0 countries ‘ awareness and knowledge to solve air-,water-,soil-pollution [ related to occupational health] enough ,however lacking responsibility in providing public services,like water supply .
On the contrary water supply by now an commercial production and distribution industry.
Europe isn’t an exception
@Ben Franken
It is, trust me. Nowhere in Europe you would find standards this low and only affecting a particular ethnic group of a society.
Tell me one country in Europein the last decade where these things happen on a continuous basis like here?
May be of interest The WHO Guidelines for drinking -water quality ,especially the references and source documentation.
Remember it takes sometime a long long time to recognize a perfidious silence by a government about water borne diseases by all kind of pollutions.
Frequently caused by industry,agriculture .
e,g. Hungary and aluminum...
Nuclear energy and water pollution...
It is not by definition the first priority Public Health!
@Nathan...Continuous? There must be thousands of Newarks and Flints in the US. And, each one only affects a particular ethnic group. Why would anyone chose to live in such a decrepit society after they had tasted the delights of Europe?
It is time to amend the safe drinking water act so that owners of buildings with lead pipes be responsible for abating lead hazards caused by their pipes. Building owners are required to abate lead paint hazards but not hazards from lead pipes.
6
Homeowners are being told they will have to pay $1,000 or more to have the service lines replaced. You are then placed on a tiered list, that has no stated start time. Not sure what's happening with the building owners. Most people in apartment buildings were not notified and found out from others. It should also be noted that not all homes received the faucet filters some homes received only a Pure water filter pitchers. This was followed by numerous notices and robo calls stating the water was fine. Messages now indicate that the people effected are those being serviced by the Pequannock reservoir without stating clearly who those people are. It should never have gotten to this point. Newark homeowners pay some of the highest taxes in the state. At minimum, we should have a Civil Engineer as the head of our water department.
5
@Tired
I’m the plaintiff in the federal lawsuit about this (NEW Caucus v. City of Newark st. al) and I agree with some of your points but for clarity, let me inform you of the facts. The cost for lead service line replacement is UP TO $1,000. This cost is being fought in court. Second, I was given a filter for my faucet but because I renovated my kitchen and upgraded my sink and faucet I needed a different one. The City should have foreseen this in several homes and offered EITHER filter. The issue is public education for the filters and they weren’t doing that. Other concerns have arisen prior to and after the EPA stepped in; google it or me. Thank you for your support as we fight for clean water. #waterisahumanright
5
@Tired That reservoir serves a number of other towns and their water quality reports indicate a very high quality of water coming from it.
The Problem in Newark is not the reservoir; but the poor homeowner who isn't complying with the plumbing code.
1
This article is terrible - sensationalistic; full of misunderstandings of how water systems and water treatment works; and most of all, not clearly delineating the multi-faceted issues.
The problem in Newark is NOT lead pipes in the water system. The same as with Flint.
The problem is lead service lines and lead solder in many, many homes. And this is through out cities with housing stock dating back to pre-1960's, that is before lead pipes and solder were banned.
The problem in older cities happens when the water is not treated properly to prevent lead from leaching. This could be a disruption in water source (Flint) or mis-management running the treatment plant (Flint and Newark).
Homeowners can rectify the issue by replacing lead service lines and/or pipes in their homes. The hurdle - very expensive, at least $5,000 to as much as $20,000 per home.
Or they can run the water for 5 seconds or more if the system is treating the water according to proper pH standards. Or they can buy and maintain a good filter system, costing maybe a couple hundred dollars with some related maintenance costs.
However, this is NOT the infrastructure program the Federal government should be getting involved in. This hysteria about lead is environmental advocacy by the NRDC and their ilk run amok.
BTW - most of the elevated levels of lead in Newark are more than likely due to children eating lead paint chips or breathing lead dust, not so much from the water.
19
@Common Sense
Lots of flat declarations. No evidence.
@Common Sense
BTW-did you read the article?
@Ant
Lead service lines, pipes and solder have been in a huge number of homes built prior to the 1960's, before lead was banned. How many people do you see walking around that have grown up in those houses suffering from the serious impact of elevated ingestion of lead DUE TO WATER? So, understand context before listening to the chicken littles like the NRDC that are about creating crisises.
The issue in Newark and Flint are real and are serious. However, they are not due to some lack of Federal funding or oversight. Yes, the article points out the lead service lines. But, the focus needs to be on the mismanagement by Newark (and Flint) of the proper treatment of water to prevent the leaching of lead. This is isolated to these two cities. The vast, vast number of water systems in the US are properly dealing with the treatment of water to prevent such leaching.
Homeowners have known for years that there is lead in their homes. It falls squarely on them to address that problem - not the federal, state or local governments.
Let me put it more simply - if your roof fails through your lack of maintenance, is it my responsibility as a taxpayer to pay for the replacement of that roof?
This whole issue typifies Americans tendency of trying to pass the buck to the government for their own lack of awareness as a homeowner or consumer by following caveat emptor.
2
It is time for an investigative journalism series on the water systems throughout the nation.
And instead of a trade war, how about some major infrastructure programs in every state? How about a national service Corp program, too?
21
@Jean....National Service Corps? How about a Marshall Plan for America?
Infrastructure, water, transport, medical care, education, etc. ...........etc.
Etc.
Interesting, the city spent $200k in PR consulting or instead of using the money to solve actual issues just to avoid being attached to the crisis.
54
Reading the headline alone, I knew that this article would be short on science and full of speculation. That's exactly what I got. While there have been some serious judgment calls that need to be called out, at least the non-compliant data was finally addressed. There was no discussion of applicable action levels and how Safe Drinking Water programs are implemented. Just a presumption that someone with a rap sheet could never manage a water system. That might be true, but I think the actual cause was a bit more complicated than one guy.
And it's not like this article connected the dots. It just threw a lot of dots out there, including a nice dot for Senator Booker. Where was this coverage in 2014? Bottom line is that old city infrastructure is resulting in all kinds of health and safety issues for our citizens. This is not a shocking conclusion and it's something that your staff should focus on every day instead of speculating about a cocaine rap. And yes, this is not Flint, where the cheap change of water supply mandated by the state caused the lead leaching and there are documented health effects No comparison.
I can't believe it took three people to write this article.
18
@Kate Oh come off it. Good try, but this guy has zero qualifications relevant to the position.
I'm an engineer with a focus on water. My presumption is that there are people WITHOUT rap sheets and who actually know about water and/or running major municipal programs who would be better suited to the position.
8
@Ant I'm an engineer too. Municipal Utilities are full of political pols and that's unfortunate, but it's the way it is. The smart pols have hired some smart engineers or follow the guidance the state provides. Aging water conveyance systems are ticking time bombs throughout the New York / Newark metro areas.
2
@Ant...Your presumptions are specious. Based on this article, you have insufficient data to conclude that he has "zero qualifications relevant to the position". If you approach engineering problems with the same disdain for empirical data, I shutter to think of your outcomes. As for qualifications, I worked on a water project with a number of so-called water PEs who were clueless. I presume that there are engineers somewhere who would have been better suited to do what they botched.
How can those in the top 1% of income earners in this country watch as our American cities become worse than 3rd world countries? The lowest circle of Hades is too good for the rich who ignore want. You good men and women of business, make mankind your business! Make the common good your business!
15
@judgeroybean Why were some of the tax moneys collected over the years not used to begin replacement of the lead water pipes? Its not the 1% who are at fault its the political leadership of the municipal government local and state who failed their citizens.
19
@MAR I couldn't disagree more. Willful indifference to the distribution of prosperity over the last half century is an important reason the very survival of liberal democracy is now being tested by nationalist demagogues. I have no special insight into how long the rope can hold, or how much weight it can bear. But I know our shared bonds will last longer if we can find ways to reduce the strain.
12
@judgeroybean The answer is that they can.
It's easy to blame the 1%, but people voted for this. When there's no respect for expertise, when there's no fuss about someone completely unqualified and with a rap sheet being in charge of something as important as the water supply (as opposed to an engineer), then this is the unsurprising outcome.
3
Where is Spartacus of Newark on this issue? Seems like everyone wants to play the race card especially Spartacus but no on wants to discuss incompetence. This should have never happened but everyone was too busy lining their pockets instead of hawking prevention. Terrible for the people of Newark.
21
Where is a national infrastructure bill? Our Reliance on depression era infrastructure is over. High time to move on, create jobs, revive hope for workers, stimulate the economy, and fix all that is failing in this country. We should be ashamed.
21
THIS. ⬆️
4
@Marlene Rayner
All of that comes under Make America Great Again. Not sure when it’s supposed to start.
10
It is a travesty that our country is a crumbling mess. We have terrible health care, unsafe drinking water, polluted air, non-existent public transportation, and horribly neglected bridges and roads. But does the fascist-in-chief care about any of this? Of course not. So yes, there are plenty of local officials to blame for the Newark crisis, but when will our federal government step in and pass a mass infrastructure package instead of spending trillions on unnecessary war machines?
19
Which political party has been running this city?
25
The neglect of vital infrastructure in major cities all led by Democrats is reflective of how much the party actually cares about people. One day they won't be able to fool enough people to stay in power anymore.
21
An indictment of decades of Democratic rule.
22
I will vote ANY Democrat in 2020... But you can't hand this on Trump!
Point being-- ALL your politics are bad!
6
Newark? New Jersey? How are we going to blame Republicans for this one?
17
@Ambrose Rivers
Chris Christie was governor for 8 years?
After all, the Flint crisis is squarely on the shoulders of the state Republicans, including the governor.
12
@Paul...Read the Safe Drinking Water Act. That will tell you whose shoulders to look for. Hint : the initials are E P A
Gov. Christie was too busy closing bridges and shilling for Exxon.
15
@Ed. Is this is a governor or mayor issue? How would it work in OKC? The city that can’t keep an nba team intact
3
I hope this revisiting of Booker's tenure as Mayor and his reliance onPR, polls, and the optics of staged appearances, causes voters to seriously look at his record and realize that we cannot afford the kind of mismanagement he tolerated and fostered.
If the "reforms" he had pushed to expand the NWCDC into a municipal authority with a far larger budget headed by the same corrupt friends and cronies had succeeded, the level of corruption and millions lost would been so staggering as to have bankrupted Newark.
We will not survive another administration that will not or cannot deliver good government.
18
From my experience what can have the most immediate effect is to raise the pH level of the water and add the Orthophosphate to prevent the leaching problem. Then spend money on the distribution system-the old water pipes for that you need lots of cash.
10
That the mayor would put a convinced criminal with no college degree to run a major water department is astounding.
Here in Denver, the water department (Denver Water) is it's own completely separate utility that city poiticians can't touch. It's done this way to avoid this sort if destructive political interference.
18
Denver serves as a poor model as the City required the installation of lead service lines through the 1950s to support local manufacturers of lead plumbing. Although independent water departments with revenues separated from the general municipal budget may be the way to go, Denver is no model. How many lead service lines are in your system?
8
@Dan...To whom is Denver Water accountable? Denver Water? What could go wrong?
In a democracy people get the government they deserve.
14
@Edward B. Blau
I wish I could agree, but the evidence is that the people get much worse government than they deserve.
9
I was a CT water department commissioner for 10 years. This story needs much more information. What was the EPA maximum contaminate level (MCL) for lead. Where is some data showing lead level variance? How many violations or were most increases still under MCL levels? How many buildings were affected? Were the lead pipes the ones owned by the city under the streets - or the smaller lines that run from street to the buildings? Or were the lead pipes in the houses themselves. The latter two scenarios are the responsibility of owners to maintain/remove. Owners without a plan to get rid of lead pipes are negligent in my mind. Also, is this a Gov. Christie tax cut result? Who was President and who was in charge of the branches of Congress that tried to under fund or neuter EPA all these years? My guess is this has some or a lot of Republican guilt associated with it, being the anti-science party. Trump has tried to neuter the EPA and I don't doubt there will be environmental catastrophes coming down the pike from his malfeasance. Lastly, did Mayor Booker appoint leaders without engineering backgrounds? I don't care if the in house manager did time, it only matters if he had the licenses/certifications which means he had the training. Lastly, does Newark still have lead pipes it owns under the streets? Then start blaming anti-tax idiots that block the water department from being able to fund lead pipe removal.
52
@Ed Smith except all of Newark’s issues began and continued unabated under Obama EPA and Booker. That they continue today under a corrupt Democratic city administration has nothing to do with Trump or the feds.
2
@Ed Smith - EPA does not have an MCL for lead. The fact that you don't know that is remarkable given your claimed prior employment in Ct. Google the "lead and copper rule". The EPA "action level: for lead is 15 ppb.
The source of the lead is the connections to homes, not pipes under the street. Read the story again.
While it’s fine to criticize the guy for not being an engineer, or that he’s the mayor’s buddy why are you going after the fact that he was a felon? He paid his debt to society. Leave that alone!
9
@Evelyn Williams
Ummm... Not an engineer? The mayor’s buddy? A convicted felon?
We all can do the math here.
10
@MJ Collart:
isn't there n-times more [willful?]
incompetence at much much higher levels?
in my [EU] country a lawmaker can be secretary of
agriculture today, of defense tomorrow, of health the next day ... very confidence-inspiring.
many of them have very lucrative jobs on the side. makes one wonder where they set their priorities.
1
My immigrant ancestors arrived in 1890 in Newark and in the intervening years we survived and as a public health worker may I say Newark's problems may be attributed to mismanagement and racisim.
5
If the city fired the incompetent, corrupt, and freeloading employees from top down, charge those parasites with derelict of duty, fraud, etc and do not pay these criminals any retirement, then the city of Newark should have plenty of money to hire competent technical expert engineers (not civil engineers or project managers), scientists (chemists, microbiologists, etc), and qualified water treatment, conveyance and distribution technicians to properly upgrade, run, and maintain the water system.
16
@pjkgarcia
1. Water engineering is a dedicated part of Civil Engineering.
2. Any public servant, many qualified,expert people, are called freeloaders, parasitic simply because they are public servants and the people calling them that don’t know what they do, or how hard they work.
7
For every 1 qualified technical expert, engineer, scientist or not, there are probably 5 others on the payroll who know nothing and are in positions they should not have. They make decisions for political or quick bandage reasons, and disregard or don't even allow rational analysis and scientific reasoning. These arrogant incompetents throw out defenses such as, it's not proven by some study, therefore it's not true, and allow all sorts of problems to progress to catastrophe. Corruption, arrogance, and incompetence all factor in. This happens at the FAA, EPA, local Health departments, and cities. Look at Aliso gas leak in California. EPA, FDA and Monsanto. FAA and Boeing. And many local health agencies ignoring or disregarding health issues from mold in many poor neighborhood houses.
Too many civil engineers, often put in charge as project managers, become focused on money and time, disregard or become impatient with technical expert engineers, and don't understand the necessary fundamental science. Then wind up wasting tons of money and time with fixes, change orders, during construction, etc, and suffer failures shortly after start up. Look at Boston Big Dig tunnel panels killing people driving through the tunnel, California bullet train that's wasted tons of money and time and accomplished nothing. How many fluoridation systems were added to water systems for federal $$, then had severe corrosion problems due to no metallurgists or corrosion engineer review?
I live in Boston a city that is nearly 400 years old. How come we do not see this lead issue in every city and town? I mean this seriously, almost every city or town built before say 1946 has cast iron and lead water lines. Why is it that just two extremely poor cities (Flint and Newark) are showing high lead water levels? Shouldn’t we all be seeing high lead in water levels? I am going to have my tap water tested immediately.
14
@Sparky
I think it depends on the proper management of the chemistry of the water. When acidity is well-managed to a more neutral pH, as mentioned in the article, lead doesn’t leach into water as easily. Be thankful Boston appears to have its act together. Having the science and engineering powerhouses of Harvard and MIT nearby possibly helps ensure quality science and good engineering practices in local water management. After all, it was scientists and health care personnel who first sounded the alarm in Flint. However, it’s probably a good idea for all of us to get our water tested.
10
In the spirit of Marie Antoinette, let them drink champagne!
5
“A Boss with a Criminal Past” screams your headline, but your article provides no connection between Mr. Adeem’s crimes—for which he was released from prison 8 years ago—and lead in Newark’s water. Would you have this former deputy director serve a life sentence for his crime, something he readily acknowledges resulted from “bad choices” early in his life. Mr. Adeem did his time, paid the price for his choices, and has since made much better decisions as evidenced by rising through the ranks at the water department. We, and The Times, should be celebrating his accomplishments.
9
Let me ask this question.
Is this man the best person out of the Tristate area to lead Newark’s water dept?
Why are the best people not hired to work in public service and jobs turned into patronage?
The times should stay on top of this it speaks volumes to NJ politics
18
@Jg mako Best people? Hired? You're not from round here are you?
2
@Jg mako
The best people won't take the job.
This problem is going to take money to solve, and Newark doesn't have the money.
So even the best people would likely fail - not for lack trying, but for lack of the necessary resources. At which point an ambitious prosecutor might well go after them, and send them to jail. One sometimes gets the impression this is what happened in Flint.
It's going to be hard to find good people who want this job, I fear.
4
As someone born and raised in NYC in the Great State of New York, I have never understood why New Jersey even exists let alone why anyone would want to live there. It is without a doubt the most benighted State in the Union and has absolutely nothing to recommend it.
6
@Raven You've clearly never been to even a small fraction of all the states in the Union.
7
@Raven
don't tell me... let me guess... you grew up in the village and your parents were NYU professors and you hung out with Lady Gaga when you were in high school right?....
you are so hip.
11
@Raven I lived in Boston for many years and I will take New Jersey any day. It is a great place to live and raise a family IMO.
3
So we want Cory Booker as our president for what reason? Another Democrat run city that is a disaster. The corruption under Cory was breathtaking!
31
@Don Locker. And the guy went to elite schools the vast majority of those children in Newark will never get a chance to attend. I guess Corey didn't do too well in his chemistry classes. That's the problem with elites in this country, they want power, but can't handle it.
11
Non of this surprises me. Newark, New Jersey has been a wasteland for 60 years. The politics and management of the city proper is a despicable mess. New Jersey (and I) are ashamed of the shenanigans going on in Newark and Camden. Those two cities in New Jersey are a burden on the honest taxpayers in the state of New Jersey.
18
Cory Booker is the biggest fraud on the political landscape. He was elected to office by scamming the poor and ignorant.
28
It sounds like Mr. Booker may not be the best person to extinguish the Trumpeter fire
22
This is sad. A mayor who lies to his citizens, and then cries the feds don't give him any money. I can only imagine what he'd do with it.
Mr Adeem does not have the training or experience to manage the water system. Perhaps he should have been given his second chance in a less challenging position...and for a lot less money.
I hope the people of Newark vote this joker out of office.
20
This is just one more thing that underlines the many problems with Presidential Candidate Cory Booker. He ran Newark for many years as Mayor and is now a Senator. At debates he points out that he still resides in Newark in a neighborhood where he can hear gunshots. Now the water is tainted with lead. Why didn't Cory Booker address these problems when he ran the City? He didn't clean up the crime and he didn't look into the safety of the water infrastructure of the City he claims to love so much.That is quite a record to run for President on.He needs to make a statement on these matters and clarify exactly what went on when he was in charge. If he cannot do that he might do well to drop out of the race.
25
@ Marian. Corey got to where he is at with the money and connections of the old democratic establishment in Jersey. Did anyone seriously think he'd be there to solve their day-to-day problems?
9
@Marian
Cory's brother was recently appointed to a position overseeing preschool programs for the state of New Jersey at a high salary. He has no experience in preschool education or administration. He did start a charter school that failed and left irate parents and uneducated students in its wake.
3
I wonder who profits from the distribution of bottled water. As we all know, small bottles of it constitute by far the most expensive way to distribute it; large, many-gallon containers and water trucks are much cheaper. But seems that it is only distributed in small bottles. My suspicion is rather raised by the fact, stated in an earlier article, that some of the initial bottles were past the optimal "use-by" date.
1
The London 1854 Broad Street Cholera Epidemic. Water and wells have been known since then and if one checks possibly back to the Roman Aqueducts to be transmitters of infection and an ongoing public health concern. This never should have been allowed to happen in this city and in others.
A stain on Senator Booker. But also a stain on the federal, state, and local government administrations who didn’t want to bother about things like this and we citizens who were transfixed by consumerism and entertainment.
We all let it pass on by. And of course, the ones who live lives of inequality have been and continue to be the most hurt.
As great as C . Everett Koop MD was with fighting the smoking health crisis why DIDN’T SOMEONE realize we were facing multilayered Public Health Crises and appoint several Surgeon Generals for specific public health issues?
It doesn’t take a genius to figure that out- only a human with awareness of Public Health and a government more concerned with the public good than themselves.
8
Hire a man convicted of dealing 5 kilograms of cocaine four years earlier and promote him to oversee the Newark water system....what could possibly go wrong?
38
5 kilos. Just his personal stash no doubt.
2
I bet they were still dumping fluoride in the water. Fluoride causes more leaching of chemicals in the pipeline. Save the children's teeth from cavities with lead and fluoride. Sickening travesty.
Stop the fluoride treatments.
3
It is possible to live for two months without food, but only five days without water. So, water tops the list of our needs, doesn’t it? Don’t be silly. Under our economic system, our wealth supports the military & professional sports at the head of the line. Rethinking is undesirable.
1
Oxygen tops the list of are needs.
2
If I was running for president and wanted to make big inroads in gaining support (think Tom Steyer) I would fix the water pipes in Newark and Flint. First the press would be all over it for months, second the gain of support from the rest of the US, and Trump couldn’t touch it.
2
@CathyK While a good idea it still comes back to:
How do you pay for it?
We lost a huge opportunity in 20088 when billions/trillions were fed to financial institutions when those same funds could have been used t rebuild failing bridges and roads, develop good efficient mass transit and fix so much of what was problematic.
But you can only give out so much money and lend out so much money at 0%.
2
I think it started with Hurricane Katrina. All of a sudden it was thought that the Federal government is responsible for managing things at the local level. NO. That is why there are multiple layers of municipal government and state government. The Feds are not in charge of running city water works.
16
Hiring a former drug dealer without a college degree as the director of water department, stop playing with identity politics, pls hire the truly capable person.
64
@Iron Man
Maybe he aced high school?
1
Unfortunately nowadays, most government agencies, cities, counties, states, federal agencies, etc now overpay a lot of incompetent and really non-essential workers to contract out actual work and engineering and scientific analysis to incompetent and corrupt companies or consultants. Look at the California bullet train fiasco, the FAA and the 737 Max, Boston's Big Dig, the sewage and trash in the streets of Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego...
Donald Trump said he would drain the swamp and that's what needs to be done. However, this would make the unemployment rate go to 40 percent and result in economic chaos...
7
This is a monumental problem across America. Lead is everywhere in water piping. Don't drink the water from the tap. Use bottled water to drink and for cooking. It's cheaper than Starbucks by far.
2
@Zane Kuseybi You meant to say that it's 1,000 times more expensive than tap water, I presume?
It's sad how we as a nation can't do the basics like tap water anymore.
4
@Zane Kuseybi
Ingest all kinds of chemicals from plastic bottles....
4
@A BrownWe can pretend all that we want. Cities and homes built prior to 1980 have lead in their piping materials. Lead will make its way into the water system based on many factors. It wasn’t until just a few years ago that faucets and water coolers were certified as lead free. The cost to create a lead free water system is not a cost that our country can absorb. Reality for all of us is to insure that the water we put into our bodies is not just safe but healthy for us to unjust. It is critical to each of us. We can wish it away but the problem is much too complex to resolve. If anyone believes the lead issue is only related to municipal water systems it would be incorrect. If the cost is relatively high to drink clean water, let it be so. The alternative is just not going to emerge from our government. We had better look after our own basic needs and find a source of clean water that we can live with not die with.
This is a classic example of inept, corrupt and incompetent government officials that over decades allowed this city's water to become toxic.
In Flint, San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Baltimore, DC, Amsterdam, Lisbon, Brussels, and many others, we see the gradual and creeping destruction of society and then the complete devastation of the most basic needs for human existence...water.
Voters beware of the lying wolves who will gladly take away your vital necessities to feather their nest and leave you behind to deal with the flaming mess they created.
21
@gpickard All Democratic mayors, not that you would know that from reading this article.
9
@Richard K. Infrastructure monies come from the state and feds though, so a lotta Republicans involved there, not just Democrat mayors.
A fair and well documented article that puts in perspective the collective ineptitude of Mr. Baraka, Mr. Adeem, and the presidential hopeful Corey Booker. It is obvious they acted with total disregard for the health and safety of the citizens of Newark, who blindly believed the lies and intrigues of the trio of demagogues whose only interest was their political careers. Who in his right mind would appoint a verbose convicted felon to run a vital city department? Probably only a teacher without a public health background and expertise, willing to appease those who advocate for allowing convicted felons, of all colors and political leanings, to work in government agencies setup to safeguard the wellbeing of the people. The article doesn't go deep enough to explore the connection of Mr. Booker in the botched coverup of the threat to the citizens of Newark. This incident certainly will weigh on the minds of voters in 2020. Unfortunately Mr. Booker has become toxic.
34
In an earlier post I complained about a number of cities allowing corruption and incompetence to destroy basic human necessities. This is true IMO, but I ...made water the classic example, while in fact most, not all, of the cities I condemned do have adequate water.
My bad.
1
This a problem that is recurring everywhere in the west. We in general created and put in place infrastructure a long time ago. This includes water, sewerage, transport, schools, etc and now it is all ageing and needs replacement. We have been sold the myth that we should pay taxes that could and should allow the maintenance and replacement of these public facilities. The reality is different. And just to be clear, maintaining public infrastructure is not socialism, it is good management. By contrast not maintaining public infrastructure is.....
14
The moral of this story is the importance of Federal oversight. More frequent testing, done earlier, would have triggered action before many people were harmed, and would have exposed the failure (or lack) of remedial efforts by incompetent city officials. Too bad we no longer have an EPA to enforce the Clean Water Act.
14
@Debbie
The Federal govt needs to address federal issues - the job of Mayor Baraka and the people he hired - all of whom already knew about the poisonous water - is to skillfully work these issue to a resolution. The problem with these inner city mayors is 1)They are not skilled, they run their government as a day job 2)They know full well their constituents are too stressed out to really change anything
9
This is a good article unfortunately it's sad to see patterns in corporation and within governments of fraud and corruption in addition to deficiencies in ones job. There is no reason for lead to be in water unless its deliberately orchestrated.
In 1967, more than 50 years ago, I went to work in the U.S. Public Health Service in Washington DC. I had the privilege of serving on a Task Force and helped write a Report for the Secretary of HEW titled "A Strategy for a Livable Environment."
At the time I was a Goldwater Republican and was impressed by the honesty and candor of PHS officials working in the air pollution program to protect people.
Then came the Nixon Administration, reorganization, and the program was transferred to the new EPA. I heard jokes that now our job was to protect "birds and bunnies" - the environment.
In 1971 chaired ab EPA Task Force that produced a Report "Our Urban Environment and Our Most Endangered People". See https://www.careforcrashvictims.com/assets/our-urban-environment.pdf
Later in 1971 I was fired for blowing the whistle on EPA for rigging the auto emission federal test to only appear to be meeting the Clean Air Act standards but in reality allowing massive amounts of air pollutants to be emitted. See
https://www.legalreader.com/50-years-of-legal-climate-change/
Until we restore people of integrity to administer strict laws that protect the public health at all levels of government people will continue to suffer and die.
45
It appears that across all levels of government, local, state, and federal, agencies have been undermined and infiltrated by business interests, to protect businesses, not protecting people.
Look at the EPA and Monsanto, FAA and Boeing, FDA and all the prescription drugs to treat "diseases" caused by people eating "processed foods" that humans should not be eating... and numerous health departments and cities across the country who should be protecting people renting unsafe homes, but instead protect slumlords...
It seems all these agencies should be gutted from top to bottom. Isn't that what Trump meant by Drain the swamp?
Just because Millions were stolen and wasted in Newark Government doesn't mean Cory Booker shouldn't be President.
Does It?
27
How could Cory Booker allow this to happen when he was Mayor of Newark ?
16
@Common Ground
Because he is an empty suit?
19
@Mike
Sadly that seems to be all too common now in politics... An empty suit with a good marketing plan pandering to uneducated voters makes you a shoo-in
11
' All God's dangers ain't white folks' Nate Shaw
See ' The Mis- Education of the Negro' Carter G. Woodson; Malcom X on the Parable of Field and the House Slave
9
Obviously Newark’s problem did not develop overnight. Nor did Flint’s. The anemic attempts to rationalize the “differences” between Flint and Newark are hypocritical at best, as citizens in both cities have been victimized by inept leadership. It is, however, hard not to notice the difference in expressed “outrage” between the two events, notably that scandals in Democratic enclaves seems not to matter as much to progressives.
11
I think this is a sensationalist article. Maybe some things were slightly exaggerated or ignored. But overall I think the City & the Governor have tried everything to solve this, short of putting in new pipes everywhere. And that would take Federal help & coordination. I heard Murphy on NPR, and I am no big fan of him, he was concise & honest about this issue. They also had some "experts' on who all agreed this is nothing like what happened in Flint. The purifying chemical stopped working. The filters were not strong enough over time. This article is trying to create hysteria & blame where it is not warranted. The city needs new pipes. So do probably 2/3 of the towns & cities in the U.S. In NYC don't they give bottled water to the children to drink.
The clean & fresh water problem is going to take a trillion dollars & is a nightmare logistically. But Flint has changed most of the pipes. And we also have to worry about cities like Miami where salt water is invading the fresh water system because of sea level rise. But let's keep spending that Trillion on the war machine & defense budget while the infrastructure crumbles. ... This is not fair & honest reporting overall.
6
@Doctor Woo....absolutely sensationalist to the point of being stupid about the source of any lead in the blood of drinkers--could come from water as well as other places.
Given the warming, there will be more rain; so collect and purify it in your own water supply system. With enough tanks and a roof collection system you can go off the 'water grid'.
Not sure how easy such a shift might be, but I remember only well water and a cistern (!!) growing up. Water might have been “hard,” but no lead! Lucky me, i guess, for living in a rural area of S California!!
@Doctor Woo - the City of Newark changed the water chemistry or should have known that the water chemistry changed. That caused the problem and that is EXACTLY what happened in Flint. So are the crony regulators, the lies, the coverup, the finger pointing, the cost avoidance and the regulatory negligence the SAME as Flint.
5
While it was the Barbarian invasion that spelled the end of the Roman Empire, it was lead poisoning that hastened its decline and fall, along with corruption and political chaos.
Fast forward to today... Newark's lead poisoning, corruption, crumbing infrastructure and political chaos are not unique, but a fragment of a wider, ominous pattern across the US.
7
“I don’t know what’s going on, but they are going to have to do something to fix this.” !!
1 Is there a way to find some consensus opinion of, say, 5 leading experts in this field--about what has been done (right/ wrong) so far AND what is the best COURSE of action now?!
2 ( An intriguing question: how do the "minority administrations" compare (efficiency, in-fighting, corruption etc) in contrast to "standard/ usual" governments? )
2
I think everyone at every level of this issue (In Newark and nationally!) should take a certification course for an entry level water plant operator’s license. Water is either corrosive, stable or deposit forming depending mostly on pH and alkalinity. A simple graph called the Baylis curve uses the pH and alkalinity values to determine whether water is corrosive or deposit forming. More acidic water requires more alkalinity to be stable or very slightly deposit forming, which lines the lead pipes with calcium carbonate. Lowering pH without increasing alkalinity will make water corrosive, which over time eliminates these deposits and starts leaching lead from the pipe. This is something a water plant operator apprentice should know! Here’s a link to that graph if anyone in Newark or anywhere else is interested.. https://www.thewatertreatments.com/corrosion/corrosion/
12
I live in Newark. I support Ras Baraka fully.
Newark’s story is not Flint. Brown water is not coming out of our pipes.
I am impressed with the programs put in place. The lead pipes leading to my 100 plus year old house were changed quickly and efficiently. My water was tested last week using a detailed protocol. My filter was also tested.
Give us a break.
Let us tell our own story. It’s much more textured than you present.
5
@Kindnest
If you read some of the other comments coming from people in Newark -- you'll hear a story vastly different from "your own".
In the end. It all matters.
9
@Kindnest Unless the lead oxide coating inside your pipes was eroded, your 'lead' problem lays elsewhere.
Flint's situation was different, especially since the 'crisis' was precipitated by a hysterical report of elevated lead levels in the blood of children tested by a nurse.
This was partially traced to a chemical to treat the River water used; and mostly attributed to Pica and other environmental causes.
In Flint, the home owner was responsible for the pipes coming from the mains into the house and the plumbing in the house. Code specified it should be all copper but many homeowners were 'poor', local authorities let enforcement lag or ignored it.
I live in Maine which was once the world's major exporter of spring water, with over 400 companies. You may be familiar with Poland Spring there are many more, like Summit which rises through the top of a mountain and because the flow isn't that great, supply is limited If you want to sample local water, contact the Maine Rural Water Association for towns with high quality and great tasting water.
1
@N. Smith
I agree, it all matters.
However, certainly, the authors are trying to support their point.
Thus let us tell 'our own' story.
Think of a city that has room for twice the population it now has, with a central business district that is only three miles from an international airport with flights to all over the world, with a port facility that is the largest on the East Coast with a corresponding rail head that can move goods easily inland, a city that is only eight miles from the nation’s largest city but is more accessible in ease and economy because there are no bridges or tunnels needed to enter, which is served by regional and local mass transit that can be reached from anywhere in the State and along the Megapolis, which has a beautiful park system, has top notch medical and higher education facilities!
You would think this place would be a developer’s dream and the vision of modern urban planners! Then think of the same city with a failing school system, high violent crime, a tolerance for corruption and incompetence by the Democratic machine that has ruled this city since the 1950s, and you have the travesty that is Newark.
87
@Bill Weber You obviously haven't been in Newark in the last 5 years or so to see its renaissance for exactly the advantageous reasons you mention. Downtown is thriving with new development, much of it high end. The impetus of the NJ Performing Arts Center and investment by major corporations are bearing fruit. Celebs are now building luxury high rise housing in the city.
Newark isn't perfect but it's way better than you and many others who have not been there "since the 1950s" might imagine. I worked there for 30 years. Have you made it io Newark lately? You don't seem to be up to speed.
6
It isn’t Patterson!
1
There is something about Corey Booker that has always made me feel uneasy. He seems ambitious, but not trustworthy. I hope this does take him out of the presidential race.
37
I wish the article had more of the most basic facts--how many water samples were taken, how many were above 15 parts per billion, how many were above 60 parts per billion, and who is analyzing the samples.
The bad outcomes with the filters surprised me. As I understand it, these were Pur filters (??) (this article avoids identifying the filters), which should work. The article says that only 3 filters were tested, and 2 of them failed. But, why only 3 tested? What were the lead levels before and after the filter? Why are the filters not working? Are we sure the filters are not working? Had they been used past their capacity before testing? These are all good questions for a journalist to ask and answer.
Reverse osmosis really should work and be very reliable. Retail, a household reverse osmosis system costs around $200. Bought on a large scale, they could possibly be bought and installed for $200 each. For 15,000 households (apparently the number affected), this would cost $3 million, which is a lot but probably do-able and cheaper than other medium term solutions, and surely better than lugging around tens of thousands of plastic water bottles.
I don't know how much lead is in my water supply, but I have a reverse osmosis system, just in case.
13
@B Futcher They still have to have periodic filter replacements; so whose responsibility is it to buy and install them?
Because Maine has so many Springs, I carry around 5 g. water bottles to fill up. I only drink spring water....local water is drilled granite and fine granite dust settles inside the toilet tank....
Ironically Newark had many breweries back in the day because of the quality of the water supply. Oh how things have changed, like so much of Newark.
14
@Bill W.....Newark's water comes from a large reservoir used by other towns whose water tests out highly. Unless Newark has other sources, this reservoir is a good source. Jersey has a lot of clean lakes; not like Maine, but still.....
6
Wonder which political party ran the town “back in the day”
2
@Bill W - the water, from the Newark reservoir system, remains high quality. It is the lead pipes that cause the problem.
2
How is incompetent presidential candidate Senator Booker doing in helping to alleviate this situation which ensued while he was mayor of Newark?
23
This does not look good for Booker. I've defended him before but this is a big stain. The problems started in his administration - which may have been a minor scandal at the time, and compared to the previous mayor and all his shenanigans, Sharpe James, it was minor - but now it is major.
Ras Baraka is even worse, and the fact that he hired a convicted cocaine dealer instead of a bona-fide engineer to run the city's water supply is just unconscionable. He should be impeached right now just for that. This is a total disgrace. I had no idea that the guy running the city's water department is not only NOT an established engineer but a convicted cocaine dealer and I am blown away by that fact.
This is unbelievable. Ras Baraka must go. The engineer from Virginia Tech says any dumb engineer knows not to put acid in the lead piped water. Unreal.
Impeach Baraka now.
40
This is what happens when state money is squandered. Remember Mark Zuckerberg gave New Jersey public schools $100 million dollars? $30 Million went to "consultants" and the rest funded teacher and school board pension liabilities.. which is still in the red by the way.
25
Booker spent very little time in Newark. He was too busy schmoozing with the New York elite. He WAS the problem in that city and this is his horrifying legacy; children are particularly susceptible to lead and it causes brain damage, among other conditions. He has no credibility as a presidential candidate.
24
Newark is just another example of the terrible condition of America's infrastructure. The $1.5 trillion tax cut Trump gave to the 1% could have mitigated many water systems, bridges, roads, airports, train tracks, and computer systems. But Trump & his republican cohorts stuffed our tax dollars into their pockets versus repairing our cities.
Until we hold politicians criminally liable for the death and disease polluted water will cause, the next pack of crooked politicians will be no better than the current. Until lengthy jail time is given to all those who commit attempted murder, and covering up tainted water is attempted murder, this will happen again and again.
Politicians need to be accountable for their misdeeds. All those who siphoned off $1.5 trillion while there are "Newarks" and "Flints" all over America, are as guilty as any other felon who threatens the lives of others.
12
@Civil Engineer
Newark has been ruled by Democrats since time began. How much money was stolen by the water department and city officials instead of being used to maintain and operate the system. Even someone without a college degree knows that acidic water corrodes metal.
Elected and non-elected government officials in Democrat ruled cities have siphoned off far more than $1.5 trillion in federal taxpayer funds. Bill Di Blasio's wife alone has millions "unaccounted for" in NYC gifts [technically grants] to her "non-profit" charity.
Blaming Republicans for Democrat corruption is denying reality.
The problem in America is not that insufficient tax revenues are being collected. The problem is that an excessive proportion is siphoned of by corruption and incompetence.
21
"highlighting the decay of the nation’s infrastructure, particularly in poorer cities."
The nation's infrastructure is fine except in cities governed by Democrats.
14
@ebmem no, there are not fine. or even close to the standards of a first world country.
1
Shouldn’t Booker have seen this coming, he was mayor and did nothing. Let’s investigate or at the next 2020 debate have someone ask about it.
10
Let's have another Infrastructure Week!
Hiring the MI PR firm to manage messaging is just disgusting. Spending hundreds of thousands on spin that could be put toward the problem seems like criminal misuse of public funds.
9
Yes, this is in fact cory booker’s legacy and his ever-lasting gift to the children of Newark.
10
Love the blame game on the last couple of Newark mayors.How old are you he pipes that carry the water. Where was the State and Federal Government for the last 50 years . The EPA made large improvements all over the country but much more is needed.
2
Booker wasn't going anywhere anyway. This will ( or should) put an end to his campaign.
45
Lead exposure during early childhood (preschool years) is the strongest single predictor of later issues with impulse control, educational achievement and criminal behavior. The cost of poor infrastructure and its management are borne by subsequent generations, those exposed and the rest of society. In older industrial cities, lead contaminates homes, playgrounds, parks, the air and the water, wherever people and government let vigilance lapse into indifference and inaction.
43
Mayor Baraka should be indicted on depraved indifference.
This is not a Democratic or Republican issue. Although Mayor Baraka is a Democrat, the Flint catastrophe was created by the Governor Snyder Republican Administration.
The problem is that many municipal water systems are many decades old when lead was still used in pipes, either as very old lead pipes or lead-based solder. This is a national problem and it will take a national solution. It will also take trillions of dollars that individual cities will not be able to finance on their own.
Newark and Flint are just the tip of the iceberg and is part of the aging infrastructure crisis facing the United States and many countries around the world. The sooner we face this problem, the sooner we can solve it. Even if we begin now it will take decades to fix. But it has to be done. We should be spending the same amount of money as we spend on defense each year.
32
@Maurie Beck
This is definitely a Democrat problem. The city of Flint has been governed by Democrats for a century. The emergency manager appointed by the Republican governor was a Democrat after the financial collapse of the Democrat Flint government. The EPA did not notify the Republican governor until six months after they notified the Democrat city government.
The nation spends far more than the 11% of federal revenue that covers national defense. The difference is that schools, law enforcement, roads, water and sewer, libraries, mass transit are supposed to be funded by local and state governments, not the federal taxpayer.
If local, state and federal coffers were not being squandered on corruption and ineffective spending, there would be plenty of money for infrastructure.
9
Wouldn't it be great if the respective state's own environmental protection departments could just audit drinking water systems by analyzing water samples collected during unannounced field collections? Any lawmakers out there who want to run with that idea? I believe this would be a good use of taxpayer money.
19
@Pete in Downtown
That's what happens in red states. Even when the EPA does field testing of industries, they conduct the testing during business hours on an announced basis. In red states, plants don't get away with polluting at night and on the weekends, because the states don't allow it.
NYC dumps a million gallons of raw sewage into the waterways every year and no one has ever been indicted or apparently even fined by the NY DNR or EPA.
4
@ebmem
I think it's time you did a bit more research on NYC waterways which have cleared up significantly due to new watse management measures and public AWARENESS.
That's why several species of marine life are now back and thriving.
Here's a suggestion.
Get the facts first.
4
@ebmem. Alternate universe? I suggest to do a quick search using the terms "Flint Michigan drinking water crisis" and look at which party the governor of Michigan who caused it belonged to. Those Republicans sure showed the nation how their eagerness to save a few dollars poisoned thousands in the city of Flint, and caused an enormous public health crisis that is still far from over. Let's just say that's not my idea of good government.
3
Politicians protecting their cushy posts rather than protecting the developmental potential of the children in their city, Disgraceful.
40
When I saw Booker during a recent debate condescendingly criticize Biden for his past, I thought, “those who live in glass houses.” Booker’s smug, righteous indignation rings very hollow when we consider his zero tolerance policing policies and the state of Newark’s infrastructure while he was mayor. The current mayor and the unqualified ex-con he put in charge of the water system offer proof that it’s not only Republicans who can be corrupt and incompetent.
91
While all of this was going on, where was Corey Booker?
37
@Mark. He was planning his escape to run for president.
11
There is a reason you want competent scientists and engineers on a municipal water utility or in easy phone contact (someone like Marc Edwards) and this is a textbook example. Its old science that lead (and other heavy metals) are highly sorbed at neutral pH but once you start acidifying water, you rapidly desorb Pb into the water. A competent scientist should have raised red flags as soon as the city started to acidify in concern about the carcinogens because the sodium silicate would likely lose effectiveness.
https://sciforschenonline.org/journals/water-and-waste/article-data/IJWWT-3-139/IJWWT-3-139.pdf
Bottom line is when you change water chemistry, you worry about everything. This is very similar to what happened in Flint when the water source was changed, as was its chemistry, and suddenly they had a lead problem.
(I worked on related issues when I was on the geoscience faculty at the Univ. of Hawaii).
117
@Khal Spencer
Agreed - acidifying the water was going to cause problems with lead levels. Anyone with a cursory knowledge of chemistry who's had any exposure to articles on water supplies should have known that.
We're in an older suburb (circa 1900-1920) with lead lines from the street to the house. We tested lead levels when we bought and never used water from the tap for formula until we'd run out the line.
I don't know how the decision to acidify the water supply was made - and what compounds they were worried about but a competent and qualified administrator should have known and balanced the risks. Frankly, lead would have seemed to be more pressing issue.
If the main street lines in Newark are cast iron and the lead is coming from the lines going to houses, then the risk would come from water sitting in that stretch. Avoiding that water would help - running the water first off in the morning and after periods of disuse.
The ultimate solution is removal of any lead lines in the system (likely replacing all old lines from street to house). That would cost thousands of dollars per house.
Hopefully, they'll be able to undo the damage done - but a qualified person is needed to run things. Unfortunately, patronage seems to trump real qualifications in too many places.
29
The root cause is that there is insufficient money for a poor city such as Newark to fund infrastructure.
Inexpensive solutions such as additives or filters are not likely to work over the long term, though they must be tried as a temporary solution.
Long term, much more expensive solutions, such as replacing old lead pipes will be needed. Replacing pipes is very, very expensive.
Where is the money to come from? The EPA, both state and Federal, can pass all the regulations they like, but the money to implement necessary repairs must still be found.
Some may accuse me of being off topic, but perhaps spend less on the direct and indirect costs of supporting illegal immigration, and more on the drinking water in Newark and the cities like it.
13
@Alex
And for every reason you've just mentioned, lies the reason behind why Amazon should've picked Newark as the place to expand its operations instead of Long Island City.
Not only would it have been a boon to their economy, but Newark also has the roadways, airports and ports with close enough access to New York to make it a win-win.
Too bad it wasn't "sexy" enough for Jeff Bezos.
16
@Alex, the problem is that we spend more money on the military and unnecessary wars then rebuilding our cities and general infrastructure.
Both the political parties are to blame, as are the voters who keep putting these crooks into office.
5
@Alex
"Some may accuse me of being off topic, but perhaps spend less on the direct and indirect costs of supporting illegal immigration, and more on the drinking water in Newark and the cities like it."
Except that immigration, whether legal or not, is a net benefit to the economy.
So you're not even wrong (and if you've never heard that phrase, google it.)
1
Yep, drink bottled water, much of it bottled in Newark using Newark tap water "purified" by osmosis then adding "other chemicals for taste and performance." What a strange country we live in.
19
Just incompetence coupled with spending on pensions for people who did nothing during their working years. BTW, where was Cory Booker when this was happening? Why wasn't he aware of the problems. And he expects to be president.
20
The people of Newark deserve better. Instead, the city is embroiled in scandal after scandal.
The article provided a good picture why that is: Civil service incompetence, questionable appointments of individuals with questionable backgrounds, and kleptocracy.
New Jersey, other states, and Washington follow the time honored tradition of appointing supporters, party hacks and friends to top civil service jobs, including judges.
The tradition of parties handing out government jobs to supporters probably predates the Revolution. Yet, as the Newark lead crises and your article demonstrate, there is no doubt that this tradition is not serving the people.
Maybe someone from the ivy league schools can figure out how much this tradition really costs America. If people knew the true costs, they would demand reforms and a civil service based on merit and qualifications - not one where party book or campaign donations matter.
Ever noticed that NASA has so few party hacks. Why? Because party hacks know they are no rocket scientists.
25
This is the responsibility of the city, somewhat the responsibility of the state, and only backstopped by any Federal responsibility. Same as in Flint. The local politicos own this. And I'm sure Mr. Adeem is up to his task.
11
It is a matter of money, will, and smarts. All 100 year old cities struggle with aging infrastructure. A city with tourism can tax visitors to keep up the visible and invisible - an likewise, so can Cities with manufacturing, services, innovation, valuable properties (property tax revenue), transportation hubs. Newark has many of these ingredients to generate the money needed — where has been the will to use them for the invisible needs? P.S. it is a bit scary that the person regarded as the most knowledgeable about the city’s water system is neither an engineer nor a systems analyst, and has no urban planning degree.
22
@Terry G. We in Paris love to complain about the opposite problem, The metro to my stop was closed for three weeks in August for a big update. Driving around the city is a constant headache with many lanes closed for road improvements (the Olympics are on the way), Some do read about the NYC metro troubles and these water problems and understand that our little problems could be much worse.
4
As a resident of Newark I have to deal with this crisis everyday. I am buying cases of bottled water on my own and sadly adding to the weekly waste recycling. I was given a water filter over four months ago and this filter has failed in the two homes tested by the city. So either these filters are totally ineffective or the sample size is too small. It doesn't cure the problem but what the article failed to mention is the city government has kept residents updated with phoned messages and I am registered to have my outside water line replaced at a subsidized cost. What I am experiencing is a failure of the infrastructure of Newark and our story will be repeated in every major city and small town in America in the years to come. Our story in Newark is unlike Flint Michigan which was a diversion of clean drinking water of Lake Michigan to contaminated water from a local river. Nevertheless the end result is the same,putting its citizens in harms way.
16
@mdw
Yes, I believe that the infrastructure of Newark is totally disorganized, as in they are not taking proper protocols by informing the citizens of Newark. Instead of adding other chemicals into the water system, they should have a discussion to be able to collaborate as one, to be able to correct this failure both on Mr. Baraka's side and other public officials.
2
@mdw
My heart to you living with this crisis. Set up a 5 gallon water system like an office has, or at least buy your drinking water in the largest container possible.
The city is failing all populations by using single serving sized bottles contributing to the other crisis of plastic bottles in oceans and landfills.
2
Fifty years of infrastructure neglect is going to haunt us for the next fifty years. We can’t have clean water and quality roads while spending $800 billion a year on the military. Vote for those who prioritize you.
160
It is a local problem not a federal issue. Both the current mayor and the previous mayor are to blame. Take ownership and stop blaming the Centre for everything. So Cory Booker wants to run a country off 350 million when he and his fellow administrators cannot provide water for 350,000 people.
12
@Deirdre. The state of New Jersey is not funding the military. You should wonder where your state and local tax dollars are going.
11
@Sri Sambamurthy
You think small. Get the big picture. If the U.S. cuts ordinary people's taxes by $500 billion of military waste, the states and localities can raise their taxes to pay for essential infrastructure.
6
Who needs regulations? Darn things just get in the way of business.
21
Welcome to the beginning. Because with the E.P.A. slowly being rendered into a toothless lapdog and tool of this administration, and with no immediate plans to address and rectify the country's aging infrastructure -- more problems like this are sure to arise.
Better start drinking bottled water NOW.
13
@N. Smith Except that plastic bottles may overtime expose you to hazardous chemicals. I drink bottled water but sometimes wonder about chemicals leaching from the bottles. The bottom line is it's far past time to do something about infrastructure in this country.
11
@DRTmunich
FYI. Bottled water also comes in glass bottles.
As for waiting for this Republican president and Senate to actually do something about the infrastructure, don't hold your breath.
7
This whole mess stinks of corruption. The root of this, and most problems of government malfunction, is the corruption of big money and politicians devoid of integrity who put their own economic interests before the best interests of the voters.
Democrats need to promote another kind of "green" deal, and campaign for draconian laws to prevent big money from corrupting/owning government.
16
Mayor Ras Baraka of Newark needs to resign immediately. He should also be prosecuted for knowingly harming innocent people.
23
Root cause of both Flint and Newark finding lead in their drinking water is the lead water supply lines installed close to a century ago. Well before the dangers of lead exposure were known. Newark.......tinker with water supply making it more acidic. Flint.......change source of water to one which is more acidic. The physical starting point for two completely preventable catastrophe’s visited on America’s minority and disadvantaged populations.
Unresponsive local governments who in both cases denied the problem existed and attacked those sounding the alarm. History is repeating itself very quickly, much too quickly here.
I’m having a difficult time understanding why America can’t get infrastructure projects funded and constructed. Politicians have been talking about such projects for as long as I can remember. And yet we still have lead water supply lines poisoning our citizens. We have crumbling bridges and roads which damage a vehicle in what should be an easy commute. America worked its way out of the Great Depression with Federal Work Programs. It seems the time is right to carefully consider reinstating such programs. American citizens working to correct deficiencies in their own neighborhoods would have a vested interest in doing the job correctly.
Politicians at all levels have allowed America to deteriorate. In the cases of Newark and Flint the entire lot should be put on trial and given the same public defender offered the citizens of those cities.
26
Yes, money for infrastructure. But the current incompetent and corrupt freeloaders need to be fired and blacklisted.
Water and other government agencies must have competent engineering, science, and technical staff. That is how it was done in the old days and how most early infrastructure was designed, built, and maintained to last.
Now public agencies and governments hire buddies, project managers, civil engineers to lead projects and maintenance instead of relevant technical expert engineers (structural, mechanical, electrical, chemical, metallurgical, etc) and then dole the projects out to buddy consultants who drag the projects out, make changes, mistakes, and cost orders of magnitude more than really necessary, because people running things don't have a clue.
1
This is not an R or D problem. It is a people do not care about you if you're poor in America problem.
Snyder was a solid R business executive who knew Flint had issues. Cory booker is a solid D but alas, issues in both cities. Same with Cummings - 30 years, no change in Baltimore. Saying the right things to get elected is easier than taking decisive action.
This is my biggest issue with Dems. It takes actions, like exposing Harris' record or Booker city's water issue, to get behind the facade of self piousness to find they're just as nakedly ambitious and flawed as Rs.
Least with Trump, all his moral and policy failures are on the table.
21
@Scott
Don't fool yourself.
It's also very much a Black and white problem because people of color are disproportionately poorer in just about every state in the Union.
Think not?
Take a closer look at the demographics of Flint, Michigan and Newark in comparison to their neighboring communities with majority white populations.
And we already know where Republicans stand -- just follow the tweets.
8
@Scott. Great observation! Politicians of all political persuasions fight like a pack of rabid dogs to get elected. Why? Because when in office the money stream is turned on. All of their decisions are filtered through the shimmer of piles of money. Americans voices are their votes. It’s time for all of us to hold those in charge at all levels responsible for their actions. Get off the seat and vote!
6
@Scott I agree with everything you said...except the last line. There is absolutely no excusing, nor minimizing, all his failures and crimes. Beyond that is the impact of Trump's actions affecting the entire country and the world far outweighs the impact of mayors or governors.
As others have noted in these comments, there is no specific person or entity to blame except for the aging of our infrastructure system. Cities and communities who have refused to take local responsibility should not expect the entire country to fund 100% of their modernization. California is very modern, and they tax their population accordingly. Communities that do not plan for this in large part have themselves, and their 'leaders', to collectively blame.
12
@dmckj
I disagree. If there is any blame to go around for the state of this country's aging infrastructure, it belongs solely at the top -- especially when addressing it has been a frequent campaign promise and to date, absolutely nothing has happened to address it even though working and middle-class Americans continue to be taxed heavily.
Are you listening Mr. Trump???
4
Factually inaccurate. Most working and middle-class people pay no federal income tax. They pay towards their Medicare and Social Security, and, presumably some modest state taxes. Property taxes go to state/local governments.
8
@dmckj
Point stands. ALL Americans who pay taxes, pay federal income tax.
And New York is one of the states paying at the highest rate, unlike Maine.
1
This is only the tip of the iceberg, and frankly trying to find someone to "blame" for old, deteriorating water systems which will require very, very expensive solutions is really not productive. Our nation will have to face the reality that in most American cities lead pipe, lead pipe connections, lead pipe solder, lead contaminated plumbing fixtures and so forth are the norm and should be replaced; and it will be very, very expensive for all of us to do that. We should get started instead of trying to scapegoat anyone.
64
@Bill Clayton
You are correct; it's lurking everywhere - occasionally revealing itself when there are water main breaks or - like this - failed water tests.
And not only the cities left behind when manufacturing left, but even "successful' cities - like NY -have huge projects ahead.
This is one area where there should be a massive federal program -- because the federal government takes the biggest bite directly out of our income -- and the truth is this is, like the interstate highway program of the 50's, a need, one that, for me, takes precedence over sending people to Mars, or bribing the next round of Afghan or Iraqi officials.
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@Bill Clayton
Yet, those born prior to the 1970's grew up drinking water from these same homes for decades and I don't see us all walking around with massive cognitive issues.
Much of this is driven by the environmentalist screeds like the National Resource Defense Council and their ilk. They've hijacked government and have used it to impose levels of scientific purity for drinking water and wastewater that have minimal incremental efficacy, yet these standards will require billions, perhaps trillions, to achieve. These environmental fascist have ginned up all this hysteria to their own warped ends.
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There are more cities with the same problem--lead laterals, lead paint, lead in the soil. They just aren't in the NYT, yet. No leader with sufficient power, say, mayors, taking control of the problem.Just putting out fires (children testing high for lead) as the appear, year after year.
There are good local organizations with good information doing what they can to inform whoever is interested or whoever they can reach, but no widespread, organized effort. This has been going on for decades and it's infuriating that for a known hazard, with data behind it, and knowledge of how to deal with it/ solve it, it has still not been addressed properly due to incompetence and lack of will on the part of public officials and those in the local health departments.
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@ss Don't forget deBlasio and the lead paint in NYCHA buildings!
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When reading this article I am drawn to the fact that two additional chemicals are added to the drinking water, I understand the reasoning;however, I have a side thought on the topic.
This article states that both orthophosphate and sodium silicate have been added. I would like to know, if when these chemicals were added, were the people drinking the water notified that these additional chemicals were added to their water? There are side effects to everything. I feel it is within our rights to know exactly what is in our drinking water.
Recently I have been having health issues that have been 100% linked to the tap water in the residence. I am consistently told that everything is within regulation. Without knowing exactly what is in the water that could be causing the problem, it makes it very challenging to purchase the appropriate filters.
It seems to me that public water reports are not disclosing everything that is being added to the drinking water supply. We have the right to know what is being added to our water supply. It should be mandatory that everything that is added to our drinking water is disclosed in the yearly public water reports.
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@Ede it sounds like you need to start with your keyboard and the URL of your local water agency. Unless you have a well, you won't be getting water straight out of the ground or sky. All municipal water is first treated to remove contaminants, then, depending on where you live, fluoride or other chemicals may be added in trace amounts, and then corrosion control agents are added to make sure the water doesn't interact with, say, your lead pipes, when it travels the dozens of miles from the treatment plant to your tap. Depending on what state you live in, water agencies are required to release yearly reports on their water quality, and, yes, that includes reports on precisely what and how much of any chemical is added. You can debate whether fluoride or other agents belong in your water, but this public information is not being hidden by some sort of conspiracy. What surprises me is how often suspicious people such as yourself fail to go online and investigate their local agencies' website before they post comments like this.
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Yet another example of how a person who broke the law and paid his debt to society is continuously downgraded by the press and/or social media. What does a 4 year sentence in federal prison have to do with the current water situation? I do not know. Is Mr. Adeem conspiring to put cocaine in the water? What kind of low-bar crime is conspiring to sell cocaine anyway? Did he even possess cocaine or was he in possession of a bad idea? Ah hem, President Trump anyone? How about, instead of prison, we just harangue via media for life people about how they broke the law despite them having gone to prison, paid a fine therefore paying their debt to society.
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@Cory
I think what is implied is that this individual doesn't possess the educational/engineering/management background that is typically associated with the job.
Is he really the best Newark could have done? It doesn't seem to have worked out very well.
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So if a "qualified" person for the job, like you say an engineer or water scientist, had a criminal conviction for conspiring to sell cocaine, how would that be relevant to the situation? I dont see how a criminal conviction with time served automatically makes a person incompetent.
Mr. Akeem is neither an engineer or a qualified public health official.
His prior conviction matters because he is in no way competent to run this city agency..so why was he given this position?@Cory
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Newark is one of hundreds of cities with aging water systems. They are disruptive and expensive to maintain or improve and have been ignored for decades and longer. Every city should be testing its water and planning now for the huge outlays that will be require for upgrades.
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@Alison ten Cate. Yes, repairing and replacing leaky and aged water systems (including the wastewater drainage and treatment plants) would be one of the items an infrastructure initiative could address. Trump talked about it a lot in 2016, and forgot about it right after his election. And yet, building and rebuilding our infrastructure would boost our economy, and be a great way to avoid a recession in 2020
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Is this different from what happened with DeBlasio, Shola Olatoye, and lead paint in NYCHA apartments?
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@Gary Marton You are suggesting something without evidence. Why?
Started writing some long winded comment: but this can be summed up as: this is disgusting official behavior. People's health is being damaged. It is every bit as much of an emergency as a flood or hurricane.
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@cheryl Uh oh. I wouldn't bring up the flood or hurricane comparison. Not unless you want these people inundated with rolls of paper towels tossed at them along with thoughts and prayers from politicians and PR wags.
Get some savvy engineer(s) in there and get this thing fixed.
...I didn’t see the relavance of bringing up the man’s criminal past...
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@School Tomorrow Was Closed
Complete transparency is paramount in health and life-threatening situations, and that includes the backgrounds of officials closely tied to this tragedy whose obligation -- one would think -- is to the public well-being.
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@School Tomorrow Was Closed
Combined with no degree for a job usually requiring an engineering background. The man does not deserve his position.
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I’d like more information. Looking on the web, it seems like that has been no reporting of how he ended up in the job and the earlier circumstances of his conviction. But the main story seems to be the mayor’ choices.
At least it's not done by "evil greedy corporations," but instead by the true monopoly with life and death power of you.
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Good-bye, Corey.
I could see the GOP attack-ad unspooling as I read the above story. Time for Booker to start campaigning for a cabinet post in the new Warren administration.
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@richard cheverton For starters Mr. Booker ought to start focusing on his current position as a U.S. Senator to New Jersey -- which includes the residents of Newark impacted by the horror of ingesting lead in their drinking water -- and not as the Selfie King of the Senate.
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@richard cheverton This happened after Booker, on Ras Baraka's watch. It seems like some editor wanted to highlight Booker because he is topical, but I don't see what Booker did wrong.
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Mr mother grew up in Newark, once a great New Jersey City. Now it's a wasteland. This is another classic example of where misguided social policies will take us, and of how the resultant dysfunctional government can be. Anyone who wants the whole country to look like Newark should support Mr. Booker. Send him your money.
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@SMl yes, it once was a thriving city with many small manufacturing companies but 1967 was the end of that
1
This is a nail in the coffin of Cory Booker's presidential campaign. He obviously did not clean things up in Newark before moving on to higher office.
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@Rod Stevens This was after Booker.
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@Rod Stevens
Senator Cory Booker served as Newark’s mayor from 2006 to 2013.
In 2015 “the city had tinkered with the water, increasing its acidity to tamp down on possible carcinogens.” It was the increased acidity that resulted in lead leaching into the water.
This occurred after Cory Booker left his post as mayor of Newark.
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@Rod Stevens - Some of us have been trying to get the word out on Booker's "green" record for a long time. And we were virtually alone. See my quotes in the Grist and E&E News stories below (and there's more on my blog):
A triumphant Cory Booker heads to Washington, with big green shoes to fill
https://tinyurl.com/y6zvjauj
Mr. Booker comes to Washington -- but he may have to play it cool for a while
https://www.eenews.net/stories/1059989727
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The Green New Deal will help with building smart infrastructure and invest in a sustainable and just future in which we will be able to survive and thrive. It starts will respect for every American citizen.
#Bernie2020
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After more than 50 years of Democratic rule, it’s no surprise that systemic corruption and incompetence have finally resulted in a problem that affects the health and safety of the public in Newark. There’s no place to hide now. “The Emperor has no clothes!” This goes for Cory Booker, as well as the handful of Newark Democratic mayors who have ruled Newark with “to the victors go the spoils” mentality that goes all the way back to the early 1970s!
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@Bill Weber Despotism, corruption, cronyism, are not the sole province of the Democrats. In fact, compared to the $9 billion that went "missing" in Iraq under the Bush regime, Newark's corruption is small potatoes.
I'm not saying that continuing to vote in the same machine over years isn't a big part of the problem, but it's not just a Democratic Party issue. The voters in Newark (and elsewhere) need to own their responsibility to elect leaders who listen to them. To paraphrase: "You get what you vote for".
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@Bill Weber,
The roots of this problem lay with the Villani administration. They intentionally set this system up in order to discredit the Democratic Party.
Sixty-six years of Democratic Party administration of the city cannot, and never could, clean up the mess the Republicans left. Anyone that suggests that is enough time is being unreasonable.
Anyway Trump is racist and puts children in cages.
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@Kingfish52
You may get what you vote for (though candidates usually lie), but you may have no choice other than an equally corrupt politician. This is why we need insurgencies, but not many people can afford the time and effort required, especially not if they're working two jobs.
1
This is a glaring example of what happens when voters allow themselves to adopt a victim mentality, placing trust in the government that it will naturally look after their best interests. Elected and appointed officials need to be always held accountable, and the only real way of doing that is by voting them out when they don't perform. For too long, across most of the country, voters allowed under-performing, and even criminal behavior to be tolerated rather than get involved and informed. Then when the incompetence and wrongdoing finally becomes so great they can no longer ignore it, it's often too late. This mentality and behavior led to Trump, and to all the lesser - but no less harmful - elections of incompetent leaders across the country.
It's time for voters to wake up and own up to their responsibility. Democracy isn't a passive state, it requires active participation by those who would be governed. Otherwise, government just becomes another form of subjugation. The voters of Newark need to throw out all those who contributed to this crisis, and put in place people who are responsive to their needs and wishes. Without that accountability, they're going to continue to be enslaved by victimhood and those who profit from it.
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@Kingfish52. I agree with you up to a point. I do believe that one of the key responsibilities of any government is to avoid poisoning its citizens with tainted water. I have worked in the sciences and am quite familiar with the issues at hand in Newark, but I don't have a analytical lab at home to check for heavy metal and organic contamination in my tap water, and neither should I have to, unless I operate my own well.
8
@Pete in Downtown. I get your point, but also agree with Kingfish about the larger point--this points to a lack of engagement with the Newark citizens with their government. Look at Flint, too, the cries in that city (and in the Times) were about how racist all the leaders are, but there was not much recognition of how the entire infrastructure works. Cities and water providers are governed by elected boards and officials. Unless citizens vote, sign up for services, pay taxes and fees, question those from time to time, the engagement and accountability process doesn't work. This problem exists on both sides of the water meter--in Newark and in Flint.
7
@Bryan. The situation in Flint was much worse, and importantly made much worse by the takeover of the city's administration by the State, which preempted any input by the citizens of Flint into such decisions as the change of their drinking water's source to save money. That change resulted in mobilizing large quantities of lead from the old pipes, with the ensuing lead poisoning of so many residents of Flint.
5
The Mayor says "In an interview, Mayor Baraka defended his performance and lashed out at federal environmental officials, saying they had repeatedly refused to give the city money to pay for new pipes and bottled water."
But why would it be the federal government's job to pay for new pipes and bottled water? Don't cities and states have the obligation to maintain their infrastructure?
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@Glenn Pape - the federal government used to provide billions of dollars for the construction of drinking water and wastewater treatment infrastructure. The federal role was ended by the Reagan administration in favor of a State revolving fund, with greatly dimming shed federal financial support.
So, the federal government clearly has a role.
Additionally, the federal Safe Drinking Water Act and EPA regulatory framework known as the "lead and coper rule" contributed to this disaster. So the feds also have regulatory responsibilities.
The problems with Newark's water will yield to engineering solutions. Engineering solutions will come from hiring adequate engineering talent, starting at the top. They won't come from paying PR firms.
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@Karl ...
Yes!
Hiring PR firms under such circumstances is a disgusting form of malpractice.
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@Networthy: ...or nepotism, or political affiliation, or....
4
Baraka should be immediately fired for using $225K for a PR firm instead of for engineering help to actually help fix the problem instead of trying to con the citizens. What corruption!
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