Water Crisis in Flint, Michigan: April 25, 2014 - TBD; 5 Michigan Health Officials Charged

[88m3]

Congress Just Ripped Flint Officials. It Wasn’t Pretty.
The testimonies were "sickening," said Rep. Elijah Cummings.
—By Julia Lurie

| Tue Mar. 15, 2016 6:43 PM EDT

• Email

Darnell Earley, Flint's former state-appointed emergency manager Andrew Harnik/AP
On Thursday, Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder is scheduled to testify in a much-anticipated hearing before a congressional committee investigating the contamination crisis in Flint. If Tuesday's tense hearing—in which the committee grilled other key local, state, and federal officials—was any indication, he'd better prep a good defense.

The opening testimonies were an exercise in deflection—so much so that the committee's top-ranking Democrat, Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings,called it "sickening." Former Environmental Protection Agency official Susan Hedman, who was in charge of the agency's Midwest region until she resigned in January, went so far as to say that this EPA had "nothing at all to do" with Flint's water contamination crisis. Darnell Earley, the state-appointed manager who oversaw the city's disastrous switch to the Flint River water, said, "I believe that I have been unjustly persecuted, vilified, and smeared—both personally and professionally—by the media, local, state, and federal officials."

In response to the testimonies, Rep. John Mica (R-Fla.) said, "I think this hearing is going to be known as the great finger-pointing hearing."

Here are key three key moments:

Virginia Tech professor: "Apparently being a government agency means never having to say you are sorry." In his opening testimony, Mark Edwards, a Virginia Tech professor who was largely responsible for exposing the contaminated water, came down hard on the EPA for not immediately warning Flint residents after an agency official found high levels of lead in the water in the spring of 2015. The agency, he said, "covered up evidence of their unethical actions by authoring false scientific reports" and never apologized for the ensuing crisis.


Rep. Cummings on the tainted water: "A five-year-old could figure that out!" Cummings grew frustrated with Earley, who said the Flint River water was safe even after a General Motors plant reported that the water was corroding its car parts. Earley maintained he was acting on guidance from the state's Department of Environmental Quality. "I'm not a water treatment expert," he said.

"You don't have a to be a water treatment expert!" Cummings retorted. "A five-year-old could figure that out!"


Rep. Jason Chaffetz to the EPA: "You screwed up, and you ruined people's lives." Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), the committee chairman, laid into former EPA administrator Hedman for not quickly taking responsibility for the crisis. He wasn't the only one. Rep. Buddy Carter (R-Ga.) said, "There's a special place in hell for actions like this." Later, Cummings added, "I'm glad you resigned."



Congress just ripped Flint officials. It wasn’t pretty.

videos in link

 

[ORDER_66]

 

[Regular_P]

Group Claims Snyder Is Illegally Using Millions In Taxpayer Money To Defend Himself Against Flint Lawsuits

BY BRYCE COVERT MAR 11, 2016 11:39 AM

CREDIT: AP PHOTO/AL GOLDIS

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder (R)

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder (R) has inked agreements with two law firms to sort through documents and conduct other legal work in relation to the lawsuits brought against him by Flint residents and the ongoing investigations into the water crisis in that city. Now Progress Michigan, a state advocacy group, has filed a legal complaint alleging that Snyder’s request to use state money to pay those legal fees violates a state law.

On a call with press on Friday, Lonnie Scott, Progress Michigan Executive Director, said that the group believes state law requires him to set up a legal defense fund to raise private money to cover the costs of dealing with any criminal charges, of which there are at least two lodged against him, and disclose those sources. “This is clearly for Snyder’s personal legal defense,” Scott said. “Governor Snyder has a net worth of roughly $200 million. He can certainly afford and should be required to pay for his own legal bills.”

While the act doesn’t stipulate that public officials cannot use public funds for legal defense against criminal charges, Mark Brewer, legal counsel for Progress Michigan, argues it’s the entire premise of the law. “It’s unprecedented what the governor is trying to do here,” he said. “The state has never paid to protect an official against criminal charges.”

“We think this should be a message to anyone who wants to run the state like a business,” Scott added. Snyder came to office running on his experience in the private sector, particularly as an accountant, calling himself a tough nerd. “The state of Michigan is not your personal piggybank, and we will not let you run it into the ground.”

Instead, the group wants the money Snyder requested to be put toward Flint, going to pipe replacement, full reimbursement for residents who were paying the highest water bills in the country while their water was contaminated, and wraparound services for families and children who have been poisoned by lead.

The agreements that Snyder is seeking approval of from the State Administrative Board Finance and Claims Committee stipulate that the law firms will be paid as much as $1.2 million combined, according to an agenda for the board. And the attorneys are making a pretty penny in hourly rates. The highest is charging $540 an hour, according to records obtained by MLive, while three other attorneys will get $400 or more per hour. Yet a 2014 study found the median billing rate for an attorney in Michigan was just $245 an hour. “The fact that a counsel has such experience is a positive thing for getting the work done, even though no one in the Governor’s Office did anything criminal,” Snyder spokesperson Ari Adler told MLive. “We simply do not have the internal resources and expertise available to address such large legal demands and needed to turn to outside counsel for assistance.”

Adler previously told The Detroit News the firms were already going to be paid about a half million dollars through the end of this year, but the contracts were expanded in anticipation of work related to various lawsuits, investigations, and public records requests. “This work is being done to ensure that state government is being transparent, so the use of tax dollars is appropriate,” he said.

The state board will decide whether to approve Snyder’s requests next Friday, and Progress Michigan is urging it not to. “We intend to fight this gross misuse of taxpayer funds to the end,” Scott said.

A number of lawsuits have been filed over the water contamination that led to widespread lead poisoning, including many aimed at Snyder himself.

The use of state funds for the legal fees has already drawn ire from Snyder’s critics. “It’s beyond outrageous that Snyder wants to take $1.2 million from Michigan taxpayers to pay for defense attorneys over his involvement in the poisoning of Flint’s water,” the state’s Democratic Party Chair Brandon Dillon said in a statement. “That money should go toward replacing lead pipes and getting safe drinking water to Flint families, not for Snyder’s defense attorneys.”

Senate Minority Leader Jim Ananich, a Democrat from Flint, said in a statement, “Paying more for high-priced lawyers than we are for school nurses or fully refunding victims is another kick in the teeth to taxpayers and my community. Our priority should be sending every resource we can to removing pipes and protecting kids, not covering legal fees.”

The agenda also shows that the state attorney general, Bill Schuette, has requested $1.5 million in legal fees paid through state general funding to Flood Law for his investigation into the Flint water crisis. That effort already came under fire when Schuette appointed Todd Flood, a former prosecutor and a donor to both Schuette and Snyder, as special counsel heading up the investigation to avoid a potential conflict of interest. Under the new funding request, Flood and nine other special assistant attorneys general will be paid $400 an hour, while the two chief investigators will get $165 an hour. Progress Michigan’s legal action does not relate to the fees being sought by Schuette.

So far the state has sent Flint $2 million to remove the lead pipes that were corroded when the city switched its drinking water source from Detroit to the Flint River in early 2014. Yet current Mayor Karen Weaver (D) has estimated the project will cost $55 million. The state has also offered residents $30 million in bill relief, but it will only be for a partial credit moving forward and the elimination of debt only related to water that went to drinking, bathing, or cooking.

Group Claims Snyder Is Illegally Using Millions In Taxpayer Money To Defend Himself Against Flint Lawsuits

Just saw the thread again; my mom was telling me about this the other day. It's appalling that Snyder is trying to use taxpayer money for his legal defense. That piece of shyt has no soul. I really hope someone assassinates him. Where's Stringer Bell when you need him? :kobewhatever:

 

[ADevilYouKhow]

Michigan Gov. Snyder confronts the perils of running government like a business

Great article

 

[tru_m.a.c]

Michigan Gov. Snyder confronts the perils of running government like a business

Great article

This will fall on deaf ears. Trumps entire campaign is based on running the country like one of his businesses.

Obama, back during the debt ceiling controversy, even compared the design and management of the country to running a household.

We've all but lost our sense of purpose in this matter.

 

[tru_m.a.c]

Michigan Governor To Blame Water Crisis On Systemic Failures At State Agency
Gov. Rick Snyder is set to appear in front of Congress at a hearing on Thursday, and The Associated Press obtained both his and EPA chief Gina McCarthy's prepared testimony. "Not a day or night goes by that this tragedy doesn't weigh on my mind — the questions I should have asked, the answers I should have demanded," Snyder will say, while pointing a finger at the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality.

The Associated Press: Governor, EPA Chief Agree: Michigan Agency Failed Flint
The Michigan Department of Environmental Quality repeatedly gave assurances that water from the Flint River was safe, when in reality it had dangerous levels of lead, Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder says. Snyder tells Congress that he did not learn that Flint's water was contaminated until Oct. 1, 2015 — nearly 18 months after the city began drawing its water from the Flint River in April 2014 to save money. Snyder said he took immediate action, reconnecting the city with Detroit's water supply and distributing water filters and testing residents — especially children — for elevated lead levels. (3/17)

Detroit Free Press: Snyder Disappointed With Federal Denial Of Funding For Flint
Gov. Rick Snyder said Wednesday he's disappointed the federal government has rejected his appeal of an earlier denial of certain funding requests to assist the state in addressing the Flint drinking water crisis. Snyder, in a March 3 letter to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, had requested funding under programs related to emergency protective measures and the Individuals and Households Program. (Egan, 3/16)

 

[smitty22]

Michigan Governor To Blame Water Crisis On Systemic Failures At State Agency
Gov. Rick Snyder is set to appear in front of Congress at a hearing on Thursday, and The Associated Press obtained both his and EPA chief Gina McCarthy's prepared testimony. "Not a day or night goes by that this tragedy doesn't weigh on my mind — the questions I should have asked, the answers I should have demanded," Snyder will say, while pointing a finger at the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality.

The Associated Press: Governor, EPA Chief Agree: Michigan Agency Failed Flint
The Michigan Department of Environmental Quality repeatedly gave assurances that water from the Flint River was safe, when in reality it had dangerous levels of lead, Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder says. Snyder tells Congress that he did not learn that Flint's water was contaminated until Oct. 1, 2015 — nearly 18 months after the city began drawing its water from the Flint River in April 2014 to save money. Snyder said he took immediate action, reconnecting the city with Detroit's water supply and distributing water filters and testing residents — especially children — for elevated lead levels. (3/17)

Detroit Free Press: Snyder Disappointed With Federal Denial Of Funding For Flint
Gov. Rick Snyder said Wednesday he's disappointed the federal government has rejected his appeal of an earlier denial of certain funding requests to assist the state in addressing the Flint drinking water crisis. Snyder, in a March 3 letter to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, had requested funding under programs related to emergency protective measures and the Individuals and Households Program. (Egan, 3/16)

This should be televised by all the networks

 

[88m3]

Michigan’s Governor Goes to Washington, Gets Ass Handed to Him by Congress
EPA chief Gina McCarthy didn’t have it any easier.
—By Julia Lurie

| Thu Mar. 17, 2016 1:48 PM EDT

• Email

Andrew Harnik/AP
Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder and Environmental Protection Agency chief Gina McCarthy testified Thursday morning in a long-anticipated hearing on the causes of the Flint contamination disaster. This was the third Flint-related hearing before the committee, following Tuesdays morning's tense questioning of former local, state, and federal officials.

The hearing before the Republican-led House Oversight and Government Reform Committee quickly turned partisan. Democrats grilled the GOP governor over his claims that he didn't know the water was contaminated. "Plausible deniability only works when it's plausible," said Rep. Matt Cartwright (D-Pa.). "You were not in a medically induced coma for a year." Meanwhile, Republicans questioned why the EPA didn't step in sooner. If the agency won't act in emergencies, said committee chairman Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), "why do we even need an EPA?"

Here are some highlights from today's hearing:

Rep. Elijah Cummings: "If a corporate CEO did what Gov. Snyder’s administration has done, he would be hauled up on criminal charges."

Cummings, a Maryland congressman and the committee's ranking Democrat, came down on Snyder in his opening testimony, critiquing the governor for running the state like a business. While "Republicans are desperately trying to blame everything on the EPA," he noted, primary enforcement of the Safe Drinking Water Act falls on the state. "The governor's fingerprints are all over this."


Rep. Chaffetz to EPA chief: "Why do we even need an EPA?"

Chaffetz and other house Republicans repeatedly pointed out that while Snyder has apologized for the crisis and fired officials that were involved, the EPA has not. When asked if the EPA did anything wrong, McCarthy repeatedly skirted the point, saying she wishes the agency were more aggressive. "You messed up 100,000 people's lives!" Chaffetz said later. "And you take no responsibility."


Rep. Cartwright to Snyder: "You were not in a medically induced coma for a year."

Cartwright, a former trial lawyer, ripped Snyder for ignoring the crisis. "I've had about enough of your false contrition and your phony apologies," he said. "There you are dripping with guilt, but drawing your paycheck, hiring lawyers at the expense of the people, and doing your dead-level best to spread accountability to others and not being accountable."


Rep. John Mica to EPA chief: "I heard calls for resignation—I think you should be at the top of the list."

Mica, a Florida Republican, pointed out that an EPA official wrote memo in late spring of 2015 with concerns about lead contamination and questioned whythe EPA didn't respond more aggressively. "We were strong-armed," McCarthy said. "We were misled. We were kept at arm's length. We could not do our jobs effectively."



Michigan’s governor goes to Washington, gets ass handed to him by Congress

videos in link, I'm on the run

 

[Regular_P]

How do Republicans turn this into a partisan issue? What a bunch of children.

 

[Regular_P]

Michigan Gov. Snyder confronts the perils of running government like a business

Great article

Snyder declined to be interviewed, but Jarrod Agen, Snyder’s chief of staff, said that when the governor appears before the U.S. House Oversight Committee, he will echo his State of the State address in January by apologizing to the people of Flint and accepting responsibility for the catastrophe.

*Scrolls down*

the GOP governor over his claims that he didn't know the water was contaminated.

 

[smitty22]

How do Republicans turn this into a partisan issue? What a bunch of children.

Who don't give 2 shyts about the actual children affected by this. I wanna punch Rep Chaffetz right in his fukkin face. He straight for Synder

 

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Rick Snyder Testified Before Congress On The Flint Crisis. It Didn’t Go So Well.

BY BRYCE COVERT MAR 17, 2016 4:08 PM

CREDIT: AP PHOTO/ANDREW HARNIK

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder and EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy testifying before Congress

Keri Webber got on a plane to fly from her home city of Flint, Michigan to Washington, DC this week in the hopes of finally being able to meet with her governor. “We’ve tried to meet with him in Lansing, we tried to meet with him in Flint,” she said of Rick Snyder. “We came to DC [to] meet on neutral ground. We never got a response.”

Webber’s family has been through a lot over the last year and a half. One daughter showed lead lines in her bones last July, a sign of lead poisoning, while the other has Legionnaires disease. Her husband has lost half the vision in one eye after an artery exploded, causing permanent damage, and he also has extremely high blood pressure, both of which Webber attributes to the water contamination. He’s had to have a battery of tests and is now taking eight pills a day; his medical costs alone come to $8,000, yet the both of them rely on meager Social Security disability checks to get by. “We are going bankrupt over his medical bills, period,” she said.

She and the other Flint families who traveled to DC this week want to personally convey to Snyder that they are in need of immediate assistance, which they say mostly has yet to arrive. “We need pipes replaced,” Webber said. “Medical care, educational… We need comprehensive care now.” While the state has sent Flint $2 million and Snyder is trying to push through $165 million more, she said it’s not going to arrive until October. “We need help today.”

But on Wednesday, a day before Snyder was set to testify on Capitol Hill, she found out that he wouldn’t be meeting with her and the other Flint families.

Snyder In The Hot Seat
Snyder did testify before Congress on Thursday morning, alongside Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Gina McCarthy. Compared to a somewhat subdued day of testimonyon Tuesday, Thursday’s hearing was fiery, although anger was divided along partisan lines.

Democrats repeatedly berated Snyder about what he did or did not know during the time of the crisis. “I’m not buying you didn’t know about this until October 2015,” Rep. Matt Cartwright (D-PA) said. “You were not in a medically induced coma.” They also repeatedly called for him to resign.

The first step in the crisis was that when Flint switched its water source from Detroit to the Flint River, corrosion control chemicals weren’t added to keep the water from leaching lead from pipes. In his testimony, Snyder confirmed that officials in the state Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) did not instruct the city of Flint to use those chemicals. “They failed in what I would deem common sense to say they should have,” he said.

Snyder maintains he only found out about the lead contamination issues late last year. Emails between Snyder’s top aides and legal advisers in late 2014 showed that they described the water situation as an “urgent matter to fix” and “downright scary,” with many arguing that the city’s source should be switched back to Detroit. Snyder testified that he wasn’t looped in or made aware of the contents of those emails. “I recall in that time period we discussed issues… the color and odor of the water, including E. coli,” he said. “Several issues, but never related to lead.” He said that he didn’t become aware of the dangerous lead levels in Flint’s water until October 1, 2015, at which point he took “immediate action” by reconnecting to the city to Detroit water, distributing water filters, conducting blood tests, and sending $67 million in state funding.

Snyder was asked about the Legionnaires outbreak, which has killed ten people and infected scores more, although state and federal officials have still not tested the water to determine whether it was the cause. On Thursday, Snyder said he didn’t learn of the outbreak until 2016 and that the MDEQ “should have done more to escalate the issue.” He added that given the timing with the change in the water source, “It’s a concern” that it was the cause.

Snyder also testified that the emergency manager system, in which governor-picked officials take control of financially stressed towns like Flint, failed. “In respect to the water issue, that would be a fair conclusion,” he said.

Blaming The Feds
Republicans, for their part, by and large called for McCarthy to resign, with Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ) calling for her to be fired or impeached if she refuses. She maintained that the agency didn’t become aware of the fact that Flint wasn’t using corrosion controls until July of last year, when it took action. “We were strong armed, we were misled, we were kept at arm’s length, we couldn’t do our jobs effectively,” she said of the relationship with the state agencies. “We did not create this problem.”

McCarthy said that the agency is currently looking at how to strengthen its lead and copper rule, which is meant to eliminate lead hazards from old pipes but which Snyder called at the hearing “dumb and dangerous.” It hasn’t gotten an update since 2007 and is riddled with problems that mean it often fails to protect communities from poisoning. “It clearly should be strengthened,” she said, saying a draft proposal will be released in 2017.

Neither of the responses from Snyder nor McCarthy were enough for Webber, who feels both of them should resign. “Gina McCarthy, if she really believes the EPA did a wonderful job, then yeah I think she should resign because no other city needs to have that kind of help,” she said. And as for Snyder, she said, “I hope if nothing else he is dead politically. He should not even have control over an animal shelter, nothing.”

Although Webber wasn’t able to meet with Snyder, she said it’s been worthwhile to travel to DC. “After two years of us screaming on the ground and asking for help and being totally ignored by our own local and state government,” she said, “to come down here and at least talk to people that are fighting for and really supporting us, angry on our behalf, on a more emotional level that really does help.”

Still, she can’t shake seeing one revelation at Tuesday’s hearing: an email that was made public from Debbie Baltazar, a water chief for the region of the EPA that includes Michigan, which said, “I’m not so sure Flint is the community we want to go out on a limb for,” citing concerns about its finances. “That was an absolute punch in the gut,” she said. She turned to her daughter, at the hearing with her, hoping her daughter hadn’t heard that. “It’s bad enough for the adults to feel expendable,” she said, her voice catching with tears. “But our kids… they don’t need to know.”

Rick Snyder Testified Before Congress On The Flint Crisis. It Didn’t Go So Well.

 

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FLINT WATER CRISIS

'You Just Don't Get It': Republicans Grill EPA's McCarthy About Flint Water Crisis

By Matt Smith

March 17, 2016 | 3:15 pm
The head of the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) defended her agency's muted response to the Flint water crisis before an often-hostile House committee Thursday, while Michigan's governor said he got bad advice from "career bureaucrats" as the fiasco unfolded.

EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy and Gov. Rick Snyder pointed fingers in each other's direction during a joint appearance before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, the second hearing the panel has held on the Flint crisis this week. McCarthy told lawmakers that state environmental officials repeatedly misled the EPA about their efforts to address the contaminated water that led to high levels of lead contamination in Flint children.

"I think there were dots we could have connected. I think we spent way to long trusting the state that they were doing the right thing," McCarthy said.

The panel's Republican majority focused largely on McCarthy, whose agency is a perennial GOP whipping boy. Democrats turned most of their attention on Snyder, a two-term Republican whose appointee approved switching the long-depressed city's water supply to the polluted Flint River to save money.

McCarthy said the EPA "begged" its Michigan counterpart to let it provide technical assistance to correct the problems in Flint after the agency learned that water from the river wasn't being properly treated. Those entreaties came "at the city level and the state level, with personal communications as well as professional." But she said the federal Safe Drinking Water Act doesn't give the EPA the authority to step in and take action on its own if a state says it's handling the problem itself.

"We were strong-armed. We were misled. We were kept at arm's length," she told the committee's Republican chairman, Utah Rep. Jason Chaffetz. "We couldn't do our jobs effectively."

"Wow," Chaffetz replied. "You just don't get it. You still don't get it."

But Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., replied, "I get it. We're trying to make sure that blame is shifted here."

'I guess being a government agency means you never have to say you're sorry.'
Snyder has repeatedly apologized for the disaster in Flint, which has left the city's 100,000 residents relying on bottled water and filters. His administration has secured $67 million to address the crisis and hopes to provide another $135 million. He's faced tough questions about what top aides told him about the crisis as it mounted in 2014 and 2015, and there have been numerous calls for his resignation.

He acknowledged Thursday that his use of an "emergency manager" to take over long-depressed Flint's city government was a failure "in this particular case." He faced new calls for his resignation from committee Democrats, but argued that "inefficient, ineffective, and unaccountable bureaucrats" at the EPA prolonged the crisis.

An earlier hearing Tuesday similarly involved "everyone pointing fingers and no one taking responsibility," said Nancy Loeb, director of the Environmental Advocacy Center at Northwestern University's law school. Thursday promised to be "a tough sit" for McCarthy, "and I think it should be," she said.

One of McCarthy's top deputies, Susan Hedman — the regional administrator for the Great Lakes states — resigned in January over the Flint scandal. Hedman testified Tuesday that her resignation was "the honorable thing to do" after disclosures that the EPA knew about the problems in April 2015, six months before scientists documented high levels of lead in the blood of children in the city.

She told lawmakers the EPA did nothing wrong, but "could have done more" to address the problem. It was the state, not the EPA, that chose to use the heavily polluted Flint River as a source of drinking water without proper treatment, she said, and the EPA had to work through state officials to correct the problem.

But her account drew a blistering response from Marc Edwards, the Virginia Tech professor who helped expose the contamination problems in Flint. Edwards unloaded on the EPA with both barrels, telling lawmakers its "willful blindness" put children at risk of lead poisoning — "and incredibly, to this day, they have not apologized for what they did."

"I guess being a government agency means you never have to say you're sorry," said Edwards, who now works for the city of Flint, advising it on its efforts to end the problem.

Related: Flint Residents Paid the Highest Rates in the US for Their Lead-Contaminated Water

Though the EPA has long been a target of congressional Republicans, it has a lot of answer for in Flint, Loeb said.

"It was clear that people at US EPA had knowledge they needed to take action to protect people in Flint, and rather than doing so, they held meetings, they negotiated with state officials and did nothing to inform people," Loeb said. "That's the most shocking part of all. For months, they allowed the people of Flint to continue to drink and bathe in and wash their clothes in this water that they knew was dangerous."

However, the problems began with state officials in Michigan, who skimped on the $80-100 a day it would have cost to properly treat the water — and waved away months of complaints from residents who brought jugs of "discolored and odorous" tap water to their offices.

"This was a very poor, minority city, and people were ignored," Loeb said. "So Michigan is where the fault starts — it just doesn't end there."

Darnell Earley, the Snyder appointee put in charge of Flint to balance its books, said he was "grossly misled" by the EPA and the state Department of Environmental Quality. Earley said he was "very deeply hurt by what has happened on my watch" — but he told the committee, "I believe that I have been unjustly persecuted, vilified and smeared, both personally and professionally," by other government officials and "a misinformed public."

But a state task force put the "primary responsibility" for the Flint fiasco on the state Department of Environmental Quality, whose director resigned in December as the problems began to draw national attention. And Loeb said Earley's account of being misled about the problems "has to be nonsense."

"Even if people were unaware of it early on, the complaints about the water started very soon after the switch happened. There was every reason to look into it and take action," she said.

Related: Some Newark, New Jersey Schools Needed New Lead Filters Years Ago, Photographs Show

In January, Snyder declared a state of emergency in Flint. National Guard troops have been handing out bottled water and filters. The city has switched back to its original water source, Detroit's municipal system, until Flint can be connected to a new regional utility still under construction. The two-term Republican governor, who was elected on promises of tight-fisted conservative reform, has been put on the defensive, issuing numerous apologies and saying he's concentrating on solving the problem.

But critics say the former computer executive's emphasis on running government like a business was part of the problem that led to the Flint fiasco. And the revelation that top advisers questioned the wisdom of using Flint River water in early 2014 put him on the defensive once again.

"I would guess that as the committee did [Tuesday], after or during the hearing, they will release documents and e-mails that indicate the knowledge or certainly that there should have been knowledge among people much earlier than they're admitting to," she said.

But, she warned ahead of today's hearing, "If we just see Democrats going after the people from Michigan and the Republicans going after McCarthy, we're not going to see what needs to be accomplished."

'You Just Don't Get It': Republicans Grill EPA's McCarthy About Flint Water Crisis | VICE News

 

[88m3]

Congress Plumbs the Depths of Flint’s Water Crisis
Michigan Governor Rick Snyder and EPA chief Gina McCarthy on Thursday faced harsh questioning about lead poisoning in the city.

Kevin Lamarque / Reuters

Rick Snyder didn’t want to do it.

The Michigan governor declined his first invite to testify before Congress about the Flint lead crisis. Then he reversed course and agreed to appear. Snyder’s trepidation was well placed. It was a tough day for Snyder on Thursday as he was battered by members of the House Oversight Committee.


What Did the Governor Know About Flint's Water, and When Did He Know It?

Snyder, in his opening statement, tried to share blame with other authorities.

“Let me be blunt. This was a failure of government at all levels. Local, state, and federal officials—we all failed the families of Flint,” he said. “This is not about politics or partisanship. I am not going to point fingers or shift blame; there is plenty of that to share, and neither will help the people of Flint.”

The Republican said he learned of the crisis last fall. “It was on October 1, 2015, that I learned that our state experts were wrong. Flint’s water had dangerous levels of lead. On that day, I took immediate action.”


As Snyder’s critics have pointed out since the scandal broke, however, there was little real local authority in Flint, because the city was under the control of an emergency manager appointed by the governor. The city is only now working to regain all of its autonomy. Snyder admitted on Thursday “it would be a fair conclusion” to say that the emergency-manager law failed in Flint’s case.

Snyder’s account of when he learned about the poisoning raises eyebrows, too. Snyder accused the Environmental Protection Agency of stifling a report earlier in 2015 that would have blown the whistle; several EPA employees resigned when the incident came to light. Snyder has maintained he moved quickly once he learned about the crisis, but his timeline is undermined by emails and news reports. In essence, Snyder’s defense hinges on convincing the public that his aides did not inform him of a burgeoning crisis in the city and that he missed news reports about it.

In March 2015, for example, a Snyder aide was informed of an uptick in cases of Legionnaires’s disease, a bacterial infection that killed 10 people in Flint. The state Department of Environmental Quality downplayed any connection with the water supply. (Several department officials, including its chief, have been forced to resign.) In July, Snyder’s then-chief of staff complained in an email that residents of Flint were being shunted aside. The same month, my colleague Alana Semuels published a long article on the lead crisis.

During the hearing, Pennsylvania Democrat Matt Cartwright railed against Snyder and called on him to resign.

“I’ve had about enough of your false contrition and your phony apologies,” Cartwright said. “Plausible deniability only works when it’s plausible, and I’m not buying any of this that you didn’t know until October 2015. You were not in a medically induced coma for a year.”

So did Ranking Member Elijah Cummings of Maryland. “I’m going to have to live with this for the rest of my life,” Snyder said, to which Cummings replied: “You have to live with it, but many of these children will never be what God intended them to be when they were born.”


Whatever other ill effects the scandal has for Snyder’s conscience, it has derailed his political future. Once mentioned as a potential vice-presidential candidate for the GOP, his approval rating has tumbled 30 points in six months.

Republicans at the hearing had their own target, in EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy. Chairman Jason Chaffetz, in particular, had heated exchanges with her, accusing McCarthy of failing to use a provision to intervene.

“You failed. You had that under the law and you didn’t use it,” he said.

“No sir, I didn’t,” she responded, but he insisted she failed to use the tools at her disposal.

McCarthy and Republicans also tangled over whether the state had provided all the relevant information to her agency and over whether the employee who flagged the high lead levels had been disciplined. (He felt he had; Republicans said he had; McCarthy insisted he hadn’t.)

Depending on how cynical you are, Thursday’s hearing was a welcome moment of accountability, a cathartic but futile gesture, or feeble grandstanding by representatives. Congress could do more. There’s a $250 million bill for lead-affected communities under consideration. The bill represents a tiny fraction of the cost of stopping the threat to American water sources from lead, estimated at as high as $300 billion. But that bill has been blocked by Senator Mike Lee, a Utah Republican, who insists Michigan has all the money it needs. For the time being, hearings will have to do.

Congress Beats Rick Snyder Up Over Flint's Water Crisis

 

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i got to watch the videos from today, i heard they got in his ass