We write as two mothers, one whose children were poisoned through the deliberate and callous disregard for the citizens, and particularly the children of Flint, Michigan. The other is an EPA whistleblower who exposed EPA negligence in the poisoning of a South African community. If the leadership and culture of EPA does not change, Flint will represent a snowflake on the tip of an iceberg.
There is little doubt that Flint was the victim of criminal neglect by a number of government agencies. However, the government agency responsible for federal oversight of local and state governments is the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the head of that agency is Gina McCarthy. During a recent Congressional Hearing, Ms. McCarthy incredibly declared that EPA bears no responsibility for the water crisis in Flint. McCarthy called the EPA Region 5 Administrator Susan Hedman, who was forced to resign over the poisoning in Flint “courageous.” Ms. Hedman presided over the Flint debacle within EPA, and told politicians who were inquiring about the safety of Flint’s water there was no significance concern, even after an EPA whistleblower exposed the danger to Flint’s children.
Because of the negligence of Ms. McCarthy’s agency children have suffered irreversible brain damage that will change the trajectory of their lives and that of their families. Black children already at risk for the high school to prison pipeline will now be even more vulnerable to that exploitation. Poisoned adults may suffer liver and kidney diseases that could potentially be fatal.
Simultaneously, McCarthy has not reformed a culture at EPA that condones and promotes retaliation against whistleblowers, who attempt to warn communities about public health dangers. In Flint, EPA’s silenced whistleblower provided compelling evidence of dangerous levels of lead in Flint’s water nearly a year before the President ordered a State of Emergency in Flint.
Because of my children’s deliberate poisoning by the arrogant acts of the EPA, I now fight for your children to ensure that they have safe drinking water and a bright future.
And as an EPA whistleblower, I fight to ensure that federal employees can safely expose lead in the water, arsenic in food or vanadium in the environment without fear of retaliation and being fired. It would be a mistake to believe that Flint is an isolated situation.
A recent USA Today reports that there are “over 2,000 additional water systems spanning all 50 states where testing has shown excessive levels of lead contamination over the past four years. …Many of the highest reported lead levels were found at schools and day cares …At an elementary school in Ithaca, N.Y., one sample tested this year at a stunning 5,000 ppb of lead, the EPA’s threshold for “hazardous waste.”
This is your fight. This is our fight. Failure can not be an option. We ask you to join with us today and sign the petition demanding that President Obama fire EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy.
Lee-Ann Waters
Mother of Poisoned Flint Children
Marsha Coleman-Adebayo, Ph.D
EPA Whistleblower
Please visit my website at: www.marshacoleman-adebayo.com
Author: No FEAR: A Whistleblower’s Triumph over Corruption and Retaliation at the EPA
Check out Marsha on:
ExposeFacts.com National Press Club, Moral Courage TV Syndicated Radio, vanadium poisoning.
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