Rep. Jason Chaffetz will visit Flint, Mich., on Saturday to meet with residents ahead of next week’s hearings on the city’s lead-contaminated water.
The chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee is scheduled to meet with Flint Mayor Karen Weaver and tour the city’s water plant before attending an open house at a local school put on by the Environmental Protection Agency. Michigan Republican Reps. Bill Huizeng, Tim Walberg and John Moolenaar will join him.
In April 2014, a state emergency manager appointed by Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder signed off on a symbolic vote from the Flint City Council to change the city’s water source. The move aimed to cut costs by requiring the city to take its water from the Flint River instead of the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department while a new pipeline was built to connect the city to Lake Huron.
The Flint River water, however, was so acidic that it caused the lead pipes bringing water from the city’s cast iron mains into homes to corrode. Lead leached off the pipes and into the drinking water throughout the city.
The state and the federal government have declared a state of emergency, and Flint residents are not able to drink the water coming out of their taps.
Chaffetz will lead two hearings on the lead water crisis next week. At the first, on Tuesday, former Flint Mayor Dayne Walling, former Flint Emergency Manager Darnell Earley, former Environmental Protection Agency Region 5 Administrator Susan Hedman and Virginia Tech researcher Marc Edwards will testify.
Two days later, Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder and EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy will testify.
Walling and Earley were both in positions of power in Flint when the switch was made from the Detroit water system to the Flint River. Both repeatedly assured the public the water was fine as complaints piled up.
Hedman has resigned from her position due to her role in silencing an EPA researcher who tested Flint tap water for lead contamination and found extremely high levels. This helped keep the health crisis out of the public eye for months.
Edwards is an expert on water quality and worked in Flint, also with Walters, to bring the lead water issue to light to the greater public.
Hedman is not the only official to lose her job over the crisis. The leader of the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, Dan Wyant, and his spokesman, Brad Wurfel, both resigned and the agency official in charge of overseeing the switch in water sources, Liane Shekter Smith, has been fired.
The oversight committee has held one hearing about the crisis last month, which left many lawmakers incredulous. The committee has promised to continue to investigate both the state and federal government’s reaction to the lead water crisis.
