Wintry mix spreads across Minnesota

MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all. 

Turn Up Your Support

"The Flint water crisis is a story of government failure, intransigence, unpreparedness, delay, inaction, and environmental injustice."

That's how an independent task force opened its final report on the lead-tainted water crisis in Flint.

It concluded that primary responsibility for the crisis in Flint, Mich., lies with a state environmental agency called the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality — though it said others are also to blame.


The group was appointed in October to investigate the roots of the crisis. It issued its findings at a 

 Wednesday with Michigan's embattled Gov. Rick Snyder.


"No one asked the question, 'What will happen if we don't have corrosion control in place?' The answer to that question is exactly what happened in Flint," task force member Chris Kolb told reporters. Here's more from him on the MDEQ:

 the lead problem started after Flint switched to a new water source in 2014 to save money. Here's more:


The task force also found missteps elsewhere. The state's Department of Health and Human Services had the data, according to investigators, but failed to properly analyze it. The city's emergency managers were the ones who made the decision to switch water sources and presided over the change. And, because these are state agencies and state-appointed emergency managers, the task force said "ultimate accountability" rests with Snyder.

Task force member Ken Sikkema noted the EPA did not intervene for almost a year and said that this casts doubt on the agency's willingness to aggressively pursue enforcement.

Sikkema also said the procedures for declaring emergencies "seem pretty Byzantine and complicated."

He details the process that went into this report: "We interviewed over 60 people, we read thousands if not hundreds of thousands of pages of documents, we deliberated probably 20 times as a task force, and the findings and the recommendations are robust, comprehensive, across 7 different agencies."

Several top MDEQ officials resigned after a preliminary report from the same task force. That report also put primary blame on the environmental agency, saying its "response was often one of aggressive dismissal, belittlement, and attempts to discredit these efforts and the individuals involved."

The final report and its recommendations do not address issues of financial and legal liability for Flint's crisis.

Sikkema added: "Clearly, what happened here is a case of environmental injustice."

Environmental News

Water

"Clearly, what happened here is a case of environmental injustice," task force member Ken Sikkema tells reporters. Primary blame rests with a state environmental agency, investigators concluded.

Independent investigators: State officials mostly to blame for Flint water crisis

Go Deeper.

Like this?

News you can use in your inbox