Meet The Activists Fighting Detroit’s Water Shutoffs
BY BRYCE COVERT ON JULY 18, 2014 AT 3:20 PM
Thinkprogress.com
DETROIT, MI — “I feel like I’m in a nightmare.”
Wanda Hill, who worked for the city of Detroit for 30 years, held a sign up at a rally on Friday to protest the massive water shutoffs roiling the city’s low-income residents. “I’m a native Detroiter,” she told ThinkProgress. “I never thought I’d see this.”
In March, Detroit’s water department announced that it would start shutting off water service to 1,500 to 3,000 customers every week if they hadn’t paid their bills as the city moves through a bankruptcy process. Nearly half of the accounts are delinquent. In response, activists have appealed to the United Nations High Commission for Human Rights to intervene in recognition of the fact that water is a human right, and the UN has backed them up.
“The water rate goes up every year but income is not rising,” Hill said. “You can never catch up.” The cost of water for the city’s residents has shot up 119 percent over the past decade and another 8.7 percent hike was approved for this year.
On Friday morning, about a dozen people blocked the entrance of one of the private contractors that has been doing some of the shutoffs for more than six hours. Police arrested nine of them, including Baxter Jones, a 65-year-old pensioner who uses a wheelchair. “The bravest souls are putting their bodies in front of trucks” going to shut off water, said Monica Lewis-Patrick, a candidate for the Detroit city council.
Lewis-Patrick spoke at a panel at Netroots Nation, a progressive conference that was also the site of the start of Friday’s rally and march later in the day. She described seniors who have gone without water for six months or even a year. Residents are trying to help each other out, providing bottled water and food to those going without water. Lewis-Patrick recalled one many this week who paid water bills for six of his neighbors “because he didn’t want them to hang their heads.”
She also noted that women have been at the forefront of the movement. A delegation of women “fought and have continuously been the guard against the privatization of Detroit,” she told the panel audience. Later in an interview with ThinkProgress, she added, “It’s basically been women that have led this fight for decades now, on issues of water, food, and land justice.” And they’ve been at it for a long time. “I’m one of the younger members,” she said. There are other women in their 60s and 70s fighting these fights.
According to Shae Howell, an activist of 40 years and resident of the city who was at Friday’s rally, activists have three simple demands: “We want an immediate turn on [of water service] for every single person, a moratorium on shutoffs, and the people’s plan enacted,” or the Water Affordability Program that was approved by the city council in 2006 but never implemented. She noted that “nearly half of the city was in arrears,” and “when half of the city can’t do something, it tells you it’s a systemic problem.”
And activists are fighting against more than just the shutoffs. “The water issue is the tip of the spear,” Lewis-Patrick said. “The crisis is a systemic shutting people off from jobs, health care, and education.”
“There’s a lot of issues,” Wanda Hill said at the rally. “The water shutoff is one, the bankruptcy and Detroit retirees is another.” She’s equally concerned about what the bankruptcy agreement will end up meaning for her as a pensioner. “Personally I’m the matriarch of my household,” she said.
She has three grandchildren. “They depend on us for financial support, mental support, knowledge, and wisdom. I have the wisdom and knowledge, but I can’t help financially.” She added, “At this point I’m concerned about sustaining my own lifestyle.”
“To balance the problems on the backs of pensioners is unconscionable,” she said.
Tijuana Morris, a 59-year-old retiree from the police department, is also worried. “When I went to the police department, I had a contract. They said pensions were guaranteed,” she said. Now, “they cut everybody’s insurance.” She has a disability and has to buy drugs for it. “We are between a rock and a hard part.”
And she’s just as upset about the water shutoffs. “What gives them the right to take water from people?” she asked. “Why do we have to go to the UN to get recognition? That’s wrong.”
Vera Magee, another pensioner who worked for the city for 33 years, also felt the issues are related. “You tried to take away our pensions, now you’re trying to take away our water,” she said.
She voted to reject the bankruptcy agreement. “We’ll have to wait and see.”
Moratorium NOW! Coalition Quoted:
Activists to rally in Detroit on Friday to protest water shutoffs, call for accountability for Wall Street banks
by Eclectablog on JULY 17, 2014
As Netroots Nation lands in Detroit, it does so during an unprecedented time in our country’s history. In an attempt to get over 90,000 water customers to pay upwards of $90 million in unpaid water bills. Over ten thousand Detroit residents have already had their water source eliminated in this draconian effort. Meanwhile, major businesses still have water flowing despite their own massive unpaid bills:
A local news investigation revealed that Joe Louis Arena, home of the Detroit Red Wings, owed $82,255 as of April. Ford Field, where the Detroit Lions play, owed more than $55,000. City-owned golf courses owed more than $400,000. As of July 2, none had paid.
While some off those not paying their bills are simply scamming the system, many of the residents having their water cut off simply cannot afford to pay the bills. It’s worth noting that, on average, water costs twice as much in Detroit as it does in other metropolitan cities despite sitting on the shore of the largest fresh water source in the country.
Tomorrow, Friday, July 18th, on the one-year anniversary of Detroit Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr taking Detroit into bankruptcy, a broad coalition of progressive groups are staging a march/rally in downtown Detroit to protest the shutoffs and to hold Wall Street banks accountable. From Moratorium NOW!:
We call on activists everywhere to come to Detroit on Friday, July 18 for a rally and march to fight the dictatorship of Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr, appointed by millionaire Republican Governor Rick Synder, and backed by Wall Street bankers and the 1%.
Taking place during the national Netroots Nation 2014 conference, several thousand people will converge in downtown Detroit to demand an immediate stop to residential water shutoffs and and an immediate restoration of water service. Demonstrators will demand that that the be no cuts to pensions and a restoration of retiree health benefits.
Under a state-imposed bankruptcy, the City of Detroit workers face severe cuts to their pensions and tens of thousands of people face water shutoffs.
The banks who have destroyed Detroit’s neighborhoods through racist predatory subprime mortgages and saddled the City of Detroit with fraudulent subprime financing, continue to loot the people of Detroit.
Detroiters have lost their democratic rights – “elected” officials serve at the pleasure of the unelected Emergency Manager, and may be fired at any time.
From the loss of the auto plant jobs, loss of people from home foreclosures, attack on pensions, high insurance, replacing public schools with charter schools/Education Achievement Authority (EAA), water shut-offs, to privatization and the state helping corporations take over city assets and services such as Belle Isle, the largest urban park in the U.S., garbage department, workforce development, human services, health dept., Detroit Institute of Arts, with selling the water dept. on the horizon! Banks, billionaires and corporations made this bankruptcy up to rob the people of Detroit blind and kill democracy.
To Detroiters, we say, ”It’s time to take a stand, stand up and fight for yourselves, your children, your grandchildren, your city!”
To people everywhere, we say, “Stand with the people of Detroit. Your city, your services, and your pensions will be targetted next”
Let’s come together to stop the takeover of Detroit, we are not going to take this anymore! United we can stop the takeover of our Detroit! Make the banks pay!
Here’s more from National Nurses United, one of the groups spearheading the event:
Support is growing from labor, community, clergy, and environmental activists, along with those attending the national Netroots Nation convention in Detroit this week for a march and rally Friday July 18 to call for an immediate moratorium on the water shutoffs.
National Nurses United, the lead sponsor of the event, and the dozens of groups and activists organizations supporting the action, call the shutoff a public health emergency and a major violation of human rights. NNU is the largest U.S. organization of nurses.
The event will also call for a tax on Wall Street speculation which could raise hundreds of billions of dollars for communities like Detroit which have been pummeled by recession, unemployment, and other pain directly linked to the Wall Street meltdown and plunder of major urban areas. The Robin Hood tax on Wall Street trading, is embodied in HR 1579, sponsored by Rep. Keith Ellison, to rebuild Detroit and the rest of America.
Rally supporters charge that Gov. Rick Snyder and his handpicked emergency manager officials are enforcing the water shutoffs to promote the privatization of the public water department, the latest gift, they say, to Wall Street financial interests who have bankrupted the city.
Other endorsers of the march and rally include: Utility Workers Union of America, Friends of the Earth U.S., AFSCME Council 25, CWA Local 400, National Action Network-Michigan, UAW Local 600, Detroit Eviction Defense, Detroiters Resisting Emergency, National People’s Action, Health GAP (Global Action Project), East Michigan Environmental Action Council, Color of Change, Franciscan Action Network, Detroit Water Brigade, Detroit Public Schools Education Task Force, Michigan Election Reform Alliance, Student Global AIDS Campaign, Coalition of Labor Union Women, Detroit Active and Retired Employees, and many other groups.
“Cutting off water to community residents is a disgraceful attack on the basic human right of access to safe, clean water,” said NNU Co-President Jean Ross, RN. “Nurses know the critical link between access to water and public health. Lack of water, like unsafe sanitation, is a major health disaster that can lead to disease outbreaks and pandemics. The city must end this shutoff now.”
Here’s the schedule:
12:30 p.m. – Assemble outside COBO Hall on the southwest corner of Washington Blvd & W. Congress
1:00 p.m. – March Begins
1:45 p.m. – Rally at Hart Plaza
You can keep up with the latest information on the march/rally at their Facebook event page. For more information on this complicated situation, here are some excellent sources:
The Progressive: “A National Call to Link Arms for Detroit”
DemocracyMovement.us
Moratorium Now!
New York Times: “Going Without Water in Detroit”
I also encourage you to sign the Daily Kos petition calling on the Obama administration to declare a public health emergency in Detroit. Click HERE to sign the petition.
[Photo credit: Anne C. Savage, special to Eclectablog]
Nurses: Water Shut-off Measure in Detroit Endangers Public Health
18 JUL
National Nurses United
NNU’s Jean Ross and Bonnie Castillo
Media Advisory, Photo Opportunity
July 18, 2014
Contact: Liz Jacobs, RN, 510-435-7674, Bill Gallagher, 818-355-8691, or Sarah Cecile, 510-541-9570
Big March and Rally Today in Detroit to Protest Water Shutoffs by City: ‘Turn On the Water, Tax Wall Street’
Responding to the controversial decision of Detroit and Michigan officials to shut off water for tens of thousands of city residents, a broad coalition of national, international, and Detroit area organizations will hold a major protest march and rally today in Detroit.
Marchers will voice support for the many in Detroit who have been calling for a declaration of a health care emergency in the city and call for an immediate moratorium on the water shutoffs and restoration of water service to those who have had their water cut off.
Lack of access to clean water is a major health threat that can lead to the growth and spread of infectious diseases and even pandemics, says National Nurses United, the largest U.S. organization of nurses and the lead sponsor of the march and rally.
Activists also warn that the widespread water shutoffs are a national test case, promoted by the banks and other financial interests who have been pushing privatization of public resources in economically embattled Detroit. If successful in Detroit, the scene could be repeated in scores of other communities where residents continue to struggle financially.
The march begins at 1 p.m. at Cobo Center in Detroit. The rally, outside Hart Plaza, will be live streamed at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/national-nurses-united
Support for the action has been rapidly building with major endorsements and participation from among others the International Union United Automobile, Aerospace & Agricultural Implement Workers of America (UAW AFL-CIO), Netroots Nation which is holding its convention in Detroit this week, Food and Water Watch, Michigan Sierra Club, Utility Workers Union of America, Friends of the Earth U.S., the Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions, and scores of Detroit area community, labor and faith groups.
Internationally known actor Mark Ruffalo and musician/songwriter Tom Morello also voiced support for the action, urging support, on twitter.
The event will also call for a tax on Wall Street speculation which could raise hundreds of billions of dollars for communities like Detroit which have been pummeled by recession, unemployment, and other pain directly linked to the Wall Street meltdown and plunder of major urban areas. The Robin Hood tax on Wall Street trading, is embodied in HR 1579, sponsored by Rep. Keith Ellison, to rebuild Detroit and the rest of America.
Rally supporters charge that Gov. Rick Snyder and emergency manager officials are enforcing the water shutoffs to promote the privatization of the public water supply, the latest gift, they say, to Wall Street financial interests who have bankrupted the city.
Notably Snyder’s handpicked emergency manager Kevyn Orr in one of his first acts hired his former employer, the Jones Day law firm to supervise the city’s bankruptcy even though that same firm represents banks that hold the city’s debt. Further, city activists note that though commercial enterprises owe nearly half of the debt to the water department, it is low and moderate-income residents who have been the main target of water shutoffs.
‘Dangerous public health crisis’
“Cutting off water to community residents is a disgraceful attack on the basic human right of access to safe, clean water,” said NNU Co-President Jean Ross, RN. “Nurses know the critical link between access to water and public health. Lack of water, like unsafe sanitation, is a major health disaster that can lead to disease outbreaks and pandemics. The city must end this shutoff now.”
“The water crisis is just the tip of the spear of what is a much greater systemic problem in America,” said Monica Lewis-Patrick, citywide outreach coordinator of We the People of Detroit and member of the People’s Water Coalition. “People need housing, good jobs, equal access to quality education and affordable health care and of course what we are now dealing with here, access to clean affordable water which is a basic human right. It is my hope that everyone who is coming to Detroit to take part in the protests also takes away the story of resilience and perseverance of the people of Detroit. I’ve been going to door to door to assist people and what I’ve witnessed is that in the midst of all these trials folks are together forging the beloved community.”
“It appears the black out on this water crisis is broken and the consciousness of the world has finally been piqued. People around the world are beginning to focus on this domestic terrorism and we welcome every eye!” said Maureen Taylor, state chairperson of Michigan Welfare Rights Organization.
“The situation in Detroit is a major crisis, said Food & Water Watch Executive Director Wenonah Hauter. “When 45 percent of water customers struggle to pay their water bills, it is clear that this is not just a problem with delinquent payment–it’s indicative of broader, systemic issues resulting from decades of policies that put profits before people. These shutoffs are a thinly veiled precursor to privatizing Detroit’s water, which will only make matters worse. We urge Detroit’s leadership to turn the taps back on and keep water there in public hands so that all residents can have affordable access to this vital resource.”
“This dangerous public health crisis is further proof that we don’t have a bankrupt city – we have a bankrupt system,” said John Armelagos, RN, president of the Michigan Nurses Association. “It’s disgraceful to have children in the wealthiest nation on Earth on the edge of living in third-world conditions. When people don’t have access to water to bathe and brush their teeth with, they and their families, and the whole community, are at risk for disease. Water is a human right and (Emergency Manager) Kevyn Orr should put human needs above any agenda set by corporations that only want to further exploit Detroit.”
“We’re proud to stand in solidarity with the organizers working hard to stop these water shutoffs,” said Raven Brooks, Executive Director of Netroots Nation. “It’s vitally important for us to use our platform to amplify their message.”
Other endorsers of action include: People’s Water Board, Metropolitan Detroit AFL-CIO, Michigan Nurses Association, We the People of Detroit, Moratorium Now!, Michigan Welfare Rights Organization, United Students Against Sweatshops, AFSCME Council 25, CWA Local 400, National Action Network-Michigan, UAW Locals 600 and 4911, Detroit Eviction Defense, Detroiters Resisting Emergency, National People’s Action, Health GAP (Global Action Project), East Michigan Environmental Action Council, Color of Change, Franciscan Action Network, Detroit Water Brigade, Detroit Public Schools Education Task Force, Michigan Election Reform Alliance, Student Global AIDS Campaign, New York State Nurses Association, Coalition of Labor Union Women, and Detroit Active and Retired Employees.
 |
| Detroit solidarity demonstration on July 18, 2014. |
Thinkprogress.com
DETROIT, MI — “I feel like I’m in a nightmare.”
Wanda Hill, who worked for the city of Detroit for 30 years, held a sign up at a rally on Friday to protest the massive water shutoffs roiling the city’s low-income residents. “I’m a native Detroiter,” she told ThinkProgress. “I never thought I’d see this.”
In March, Detroit’s water department announced that it would start shutting off water service to 1,500 to 3,000 customers every week if they hadn’t paid their bills as the city moves through a bankruptcy process. Nearly half of the accounts are delinquent. In response, activists have appealed to the United Nations High Commission for Human Rights to intervene in recognition of the fact that water is a human right, and the UN has backed them up.
“The water rate goes up every year but income is not rising,” Hill said. “You can never catch up.” The cost of water for the city’s residents has shot up 119 percent over the past decade and another 8.7 percent hike was approved for this year.
On Friday morning, about a dozen people blocked the entrance of one of the private contractors that has been doing some of the shutoffs for more than six hours. Police arrested nine of them, including Baxter Jones, a 65-year-old pensioner who uses a wheelchair. “The bravest souls are putting their bodies in front of trucks” going to shut off water, said Monica Lewis-Patrick, a candidate for the Detroit city council.
Lewis-Patrick spoke at a panel at Netroots Nation, a progressive conference that was also the site of the start of Friday’s rally and march later in the day. She described seniors who have gone without water for six months or even a year. Residents are trying to help each other out, providing bottled water and food to those going without water. Lewis-Patrick recalled one many this week who paid water bills for six of his neighbors “because he didn’t want them to hang their heads.”
She also noted that women have been at the forefront of the movement. A delegation of women “fought and have continuously been the guard against the privatization of Detroit,” she told the panel audience. Later in an interview with ThinkProgress, she added, “It’s basically been women that have led this fight for decades now, on issues of water, food, and land justice.” And they’ve been at it for a long time. “I’m one of the younger members,” she said. There are other women in their 60s and 70s fighting these fights.
According to Shae Howell, an activist of 40 years and resident of the city who was at Friday’s rally, activists have three simple demands: “We want an immediate turn on [of water service] for every single person, a moratorium on shutoffs, and the people’s plan enacted,” or the Water Affordability Program that was approved by the city council in 2006 but never implemented. She noted that “nearly half of the city was in arrears,” and “when half of the city can’t do something, it tells you it’s a systemic problem.”
And activists are fighting against more than just the shutoffs. “The water issue is the tip of the spear,” Lewis-Patrick said. “The crisis is a systemic shutting people off from jobs, health care, and education.”
“There’s a lot of issues,” Wanda Hill said at the rally. “The water shutoff is one, the bankruptcy and Detroit retirees is another.” She’s equally concerned about what the bankruptcy agreement will end up meaning for her as a pensioner. “Personally I’m the matriarch of my household,” she said.
She has three grandchildren. “They depend on us for financial support, mental support, knowledge, and wisdom. I have the wisdom and knowledge, but I can’t help financially.” She added, “At this point I’m concerned about sustaining my own lifestyle.”
“To balance the problems on the backs of pensioners is unconscionable,” she said.
Tijuana Morris, a 59-year-old retiree from the police department, is also worried. “When I went to the police department, I had a contract. They said pensions were guaranteed,” she said. Now, “they cut everybody’s insurance.” She has a disability and has to buy drugs for it. “We are between a rock and a hard part.”
And she’s just as upset about the water shutoffs. “What gives them the right to take water from people?” she asked. “Why do we have to go to the UN to get recognition? That’s wrong.”
Vera Magee, another pensioner who worked for the city for 33 years, also felt the issues are related. “You tried to take away our pensions, now you’re trying to take away our water,” she said.
She voted to reject the bankruptcy agreement. “We’ll have to wait and see.”
Moratorium NOW! Coalition Quoted:
Activists to rally in Detroit on Friday to protest water shutoffs, call for accountability for Wall Street banks
by Eclectablog on JULY 17, 2014
As Netroots Nation lands in Detroit, it does so during an unprecedented time in our country’s history. In an attempt to get over 90,000 water customers to pay upwards of $90 million in unpaid water bills. Over ten thousand Detroit residents have already had their water source eliminated in this draconian effort. Meanwhile, major businesses still have water flowing despite their own massive unpaid bills:
A local news investigation revealed that Joe Louis Arena, home of the Detroit Red Wings, owed $82,255 as of April. Ford Field, where the Detroit Lions play, owed more than $55,000. City-owned golf courses owed more than $400,000. As of July 2, none had paid.
While some off those not paying their bills are simply scamming the system, many of the residents having their water cut off simply cannot afford to pay the bills. It’s worth noting that, on average, water costs twice as much in Detroit as it does in other metropolitan cities despite sitting on the shore of the largest fresh water source in the country.
Tomorrow, Friday, July 18th, on the one-year anniversary of Detroit Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr taking Detroit into bankruptcy, a broad coalition of progressive groups are staging a march/rally in downtown Detroit to protest the shutoffs and to hold Wall Street banks accountable. From Moratorium NOW!:
We call on activists everywhere to come to Detroit on Friday, July 18 for a rally and march to fight the dictatorship of Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr, appointed by millionaire Republican Governor Rick Synder, and backed by Wall Street bankers and the 1%.
Taking place during the national Netroots Nation 2014 conference, several thousand people will converge in downtown Detroit to demand an immediate stop to residential water shutoffs and and an immediate restoration of water service. Demonstrators will demand that that the be no cuts to pensions and a restoration of retiree health benefits.
Under a state-imposed bankruptcy, the City of Detroit workers face severe cuts to their pensions and tens of thousands of people face water shutoffs.
The banks who have destroyed Detroit’s neighborhoods through racist predatory subprime mortgages and saddled the City of Detroit with fraudulent subprime financing, continue to loot the people of Detroit.
Detroiters have lost their democratic rights – “elected” officials serve at the pleasure of the unelected Emergency Manager, and may be fired at any time.
From the loss of the auto plant jobs, loss of people from home foreclosures, attack on pensions, high insurance, replacing public schools with charter schools/Education Achievement Authority (EAA), water shut-offs, to privatization and the state helping corporations take over city assets and services such as Belle Isle, the largest urban park in the U.S., garbage department, workforce development, human services, health dept., Detroit Institute of Arts, with selling the water dept. on the horizon! Banks, billionaires and corporations made this bankruptcy up to rob the people of Detroit blind and kill democracy.
To Detroiters, we say, ”It’s time to take a stand, stand up and fight for yourselves, your children, your grandchildren, your city!”
To people everywhere, we say, “Stand with the people of Detroit. Your city, your services, and your pensions will be targetted next”
Let’s come together to stop the takeover of Detroit, we are not going to take this anymore! United we can stop the takeover of our Detroit! Make the banks pay!
Here’s more from National Nurses United, one of the groups spearheading the event:
Support is growing from labor, community, clergy, and environmental activists, along with those attending the national Netroots Nation convention in Detroit this week for a march and rally Friday July 18 to call for an immediate moratorium on the water shutoffs.
National Nurses United, the lead sponsor of the event, and the dozens of groups and activists organizations supporting the action, call the shutoff a public health emergency and a major violation of human rights. NNU is the largest U.S. organization of nurses.
The event will also call for a tax on Wall Street speculation which could raise hundreds of billions of dollars for communities like Detroit which have been pummeled by recession, unemployment, and other pain directly linked to the Wall Street meltdown and plunder of major urban areas. The Robin Hood tax on Wall Street trading, is embodied in HR 1579, sponsored by Rep. Keith Ellison, to rebuild Detroit and the rest of America.
Rally supporters charge that Gov. Rick Snyder and his handpicked emergency manager officials are enforcing the water shutoffs to promote the privatization of the public water department, the latest gift, they say, to Wall Street financial interests who have bankrupted the city.
Other endorsers of the march and rally include: Utility Workers Union of America, Friends of the Earth U.S., AFSCME Council 25, CWA Local 400, National Action Network-Michigan, UAW Local 600, Detroit Eviction Defense, Detroiters Resisting Emergency, National People’s Action, Health GAP (Global Action Project), East Michigan Environmental Action Council, Color of Change, Franciscan Action Network, Detroit Water Brigade, Detroit Public Schools Education Task Force, Michigan Election Reform Alliance, Student Global AIDS Campaign, Coalition of Labor Union Women, Detroit Active and Retired Employees, and many other groups.
“Cutting off water to community residents is a disgraceful attack on the basic human right of access to safe, clean water,” said NNU Co-President Jean Ross, RN. “Nurses know the critical link between access to water and public health. Lack of water, like unsafe sanitation, is a major health disaster that can lead to disease outbreaks and pandemics. The city must end this shutoff now.”
Here’s the schedule:
12:30 p.m. – Assemble outside COBO Hall on the southwest corner of Washington Blvd & W. Congress
1:00 p.m. – March Begins
1:45 p.m. – Rally at Hart Plaza
You can keep up with the latest information on the march/rally at their Facebook event page. For more information on this complicated situation, here are some excellent sources:
The Progressive: “A National Call to Link Arms for Detroit”
DemocracyMovement.us
Moratorium Now!
New York Times: “Going Without Water in Detroit”
I also encourage you to sign the Daily Kos petition calling on the Obama administration to declare a public health emergency in Detroit. Click HERE to sign the petition.
[Photo credit: Anne C. Savage, special to Eclectablog]
Nurses: Water Shut-off Measure in Detroit Endangers Public Health
18 JUL
National Nurses United
NNU’s Jean Ross and Bonnie Castillo
Media Advisory, Photo Opportunity
July 18, 2014
Contact: Liz Jacobs, RN, 510-435-7674, Bill Gallagher, 818-355-8691, or Sarah Cecile, 510-541-9570
Big March and Rally Today in Detroit to Protest Water Shutoffs by City: ‘Turn On the Water, Tax Wall Street’
Responding to the controversial decision of Detroit and Michigan officials to shut off water for tens of thousands of city residents, a broad coalition of national, international, and Detroit area organizations will hold a major protest march and rally today in Detroit.
Marchers will voice support for the many in Detroit who have been calling for a declaration of a health care emergency in the city and call for an immediate moratorium on the water shutoffs and restoration of water service to those who have had their water cut off.
Lack of access to clean water is a major health threat that can lead to the growth and spread of infectious diseases and even pandemics, says National Nurses United, the largest U.S. organization of nurses and the lead sponsor of the march and rally.
Activists also warn that the widespread water shutoffs are a national test case, promoted by the banks and other financial interests who have been pushing privatization of public resources in economically embattled Detroit. If successful in Detroit, the scene could be repeated in scores of other communities where residents continue to struggle financially.
The march begins at 1 p.m. at Cobo Center in Detroit. The rally, outside Hart Plaza, will be live streamed at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/national-nurses-united
Support for the action has been rapidly building with major endorsements and participation from among others the International Union United Automobile, Aerospace & Agricultural Implement Workers of America (UAW AFL-CIO), Netroots Nation which is holding its convention in Detroit this week, Food and Water Watch, Michigan Sierra Club, Utility Workers Union of America, Friends of the Earth U.S., the Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions, and scores of Detroit area community, labor and faith groups.
Internationally known actor Mark Ruffalo and musician/songwriter Tom Morello also voiced support for the action, urging support, on twitter.
The event will also call for a tax on Wall Street speculation which could raise hundreds of billions of dollars for communities like Detroit which have been pummeled by recession, unemployment, and other pain directly linked to the Wall Street meltdown and plunder of major urban areas. The Robin Hood tax on Wall Street trading, is embodied in HR 1579, sponsored by Rep. Keith Ellison, to rebuild Detroit and the rest of America.
Rally supporters charge that Gov. Rick Snyder and emergency manager officials are enforcing the water shutoffs to promote the privatization of the public water supply, the latest gift, they say, to Wall Street financial interests who have bankrupted the city.
Notably Snyder’s handpicked emergency manager Kevyn Orr in one of his first acts hired his former employer, the Jones Day law firm to supervise the city’s bankruptcy even though that same firm represents banks that hold the city’s debt. Further, city activists note that though commercial enterprises owe nearly half of the debt to the water department, it is low and moderate-income residents who have been the main target of water shutoffs.
‘Dangerous public health crisis’
“Cutting off water to community residents is a disgraceful attack on the basic human right of access to safe, clean water,” said NNU Co-President Jean Ross, RN. “Nurses know the critical link between access to water and public health. Lack of water, like unsafe sanitation, is a major health disaster that can lead to disease outbreaks and pandemics. The city must end this shutoff now.”
“The water crisis is just the tip of the spear of what is a much greater systemic problem in America,” said Monica Lewis-Patrick, citywide outreach coordinator of We the People of Detroit and member of the People’s Water Coalition. “People need housing, good jobs, equal access to quality education and affordable health care and of course what we are now dealing with here, access to clean affordable water which is a basic human right. It is my hope that everyone who is coming to Detroit to take part in the protests also takes away the story of resilience and perseverance of the people of Detroit. I’ve been going to door to door to assist people and what I’ve witnessed is that in the midst of all these trials folks are together forging the beloved community.”
“It appears the black out on this water crisis is broken and the consciousness of the world has finally been piqued. People around the world are beginning to focus on this domestic terrorism and we welcome every eye!” said Maureen Taylor, state chairperson of Michigan Welfare Rights Organization.
“The situation in Detroit is a major crisis, said Food & Water Watch Executive Director Wenonah Hauter. “When 45 percent of water customers struggle to pay their water bills, it is clear that this is not just a problem with delinquent payment–it’s indicative of broader, systemic issues resulting from decades of policies that put profits before people. These shutoffs are a thinly veiled precursor to privatizing Detroit’s water, which will only make matters worse. We urge Detroit’s leadership to turn the taps back on and keep water there in public hands so that all residents can have affordable access to this vital resource.”
“This dangerous public health crisis is further proof that we don’t have a bankrupt city – we have a bankrupt system,” said John Armelagos, RN, president of the Michigan Nurses Association. “It’s disgraceful to have children in the wealthiest nation on Earth on the edge of living in third-world conditions. When people don’t have access to water to bathe and brush their teeth with, they and their families, and the whole community, are at risk for disease. Water is a human right and (Emergency Manager) Kevyn Orr should put human needs above any agenda set by corporations that only want to further exploit Detroit.”
“We’re proud to stand in solidarity with the organizers working hard to stop these water shutoffs,” said Raven Brooks, Executive Director of Netroots Nation. “It’s vitally important for us to use our platform to amplify their message.”
Other endorsers of action include: People’s Water Board, Metropolitan Detroit AFL-CIO, Michigan Nurses Association, We the People of Detroit, Moratorium Now!, Michigan Welfare Rights Organization, United Students Against Sweatshops, AFSCME Council 25, CWA Local 400, National Action Network-Michigan, UAW Locals 600 and 4911, Detroit Eviction Defense, Detroiters Resisting Emergency, National People’s Action, Health GAP (Global Action Project), East Michigan Environmental Action Council, Color of Change, Franciscan Action Network, Detroit Water Brigade, Detroit Public Schools Education Task Force, Michigan Election Reform Alliance, Student Global AIDS Campaign, New York State Nurses Association, Coalition of Labor Union Women, and Detroit Active and Retired Employees.
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