Michigan officials “misled” the Environmental Protection Agency in the run-up to the drinking water contamination crisis that has rocked the struggling factory town of Flint, Mich., the head of the agency said.
EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy told reporters Tuesday in Flint that she is looking at whether her agency did everything possible in response to the lead contamination crisis. “But I do know we were misled, we were rebuffed and we were ignored. Does that mean we did everything we could? No,” she added, according to NBC News.
McCarthy said the problem centers on whether Michigan environmental authorities put in place controls to prevent lead from entering the Flint water supply.
“We were told that it was and a few weeks later we were told it wasn’t,” she said.
The lead contamination was caused by a governor-appointed manager, who chose to use water from the highly polluted Flint River to feed the town’s drinking water supply to save money.
The corrosive water of the river broke down the lead pipes used to deliver water to homes, thereby releasing dangerous concentrations of the metal into the city’s water supply.
