One neighborhood at the edge of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, was left off the grid for decades as municipal water systems expanded around them. The Robert Eubanks community, a historically African American neighborhood, had to rely on private wells, which were often contaminated. They watched – and waited – as the white neighborhoods around them hooked up to city water systems, which residents felt provided cleaner, safer water.

Residents and scholars said race may have played a role in the community’s lack of access to the city water. Reporter Bryn Caswell takes us to the community.

To see the full News21 report on “Troubled Water,” go to troubledwater.news21.com on Aug. 14.

 

Robert Campbell stands at the edge of the forest in his North Carolina community. (Photo by Fionnuala O’Leary/News21)

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The former Carver Terrace sits vacant in Texarkana, Texas. (Photo by William Taylor Potter/News21)

PHOENIX – Patsy Oliver wanted the white picket fence dream, so the single mother jumped at the chance to to move to the Carver Terrace subdivision in Texarkana, Texas, where she could have a yard and garden.

“It was an affluent, black neighborhood. Everybody wanted to live in Carver Terrace,” said Bess Gamble-Williams, Oliver’s daughter who grew up in Carver Terrace. “When the deaths and the sicknesses started … we could not understand it.”

Carver Terrace was built on the former property of Koppers Co. Inc., which used creosote and other potentially dangerous chemicals to treat wood for railroad ties. According to the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, creosote is a “probable carcinogen” and exposure can lead to lung, stomach, skin, kidney and liver problems.

Koppers stopped production in 1961 and sold 34 acres of the property to Carver Terrace Inc., in 1964. Later, the EPA found several heavy metals in groundwater, according to Catherine Howard, the dean of science, technology, engineering and mathematics at Texarkana College. Some samples had dangerous levels of arsenic, iron, chromium, nickel, lead and zinc.

The former Carver Terrace sits vacant in Texarkana, Texas. (Photo by William Taylor Potter/News21)

In 1984, the land was designated as a Superfund Site, and in 1993, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers completed the buyout and relocation of affected residents, according to the EPA. The Superfund program is designed to clean up some of the nation’s most contaminated lands.

Oliver quickly became one of the community’s outspoken critics.

Decades after her mother’s fight, Gamble-Williams started working with high school students to spread Oliver’s message of “environmental racism” to a new generation of Texarkana residents. Their tribute to Oliver’s work is a 12-minute documentary, “Poison in the Pipes,” featuring Carver Terrace and Gamble-Williams speaking on Oliver’s work.

“After we aired it, several people stood up and gave their own testimony,” said Cailey Robinson, one of the students who produced the documentary, which debuted in July. “People were crying. It was a really beautiful moment.”

The demolition of Carver Terrace began Dec. 16, 1993 – the same day Oliver died. Odin Contreras, another member of the documentary team, said visiting the vacant site was a haunting part of the experience.

“Seeing all the markers and the concrete, and knowing that these people used to live here and the protests and all the awful things going on, I got a little emotional,” Contreras said. “They were dying because they wanted to live better lives.”

 To see the full News21 report on “Troubled Water,” go to troubledwater.news21.com on Aug. 14.

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Tory Lowe has always been a community advocate in Milwaukee. The city has antiquated infrastructure with more than 70,000 suspected lead service lines that need replacement. (Photo by Michael M. Santiago/News21)

MILWAUKEE – When Milwaukee native Tory Lowe found out about the lead service lines running through Milwaukee, he took a different approach to help spread the word that the water is unsafe to consume.

Along with producer Godzilla and rapper Eric “EP” Perkins, they formed The Midwest Connect and wrote a song titled “Don’t Drink the Water.”

The song describes the problem: “Poison coming through the sink, but it seems like nobody cares. Thousands of kids jacked for life cuz they don’t want to stop and fix the pipes.”

The lead lines are especially prevalent in the south side and the north side of Milwaukee, a predominantly African American part of the city, according to a list on Milwaukee’s water department website.

Lowe does advocacy work to help those in need. He uses his Facebook page, where he has amassed more than 30,000 followers, to spread awareness when a kidnapping or murder happens. He also goes live on Facebook during protests or community events, such as the start of a summer basketball league.

Milwaukee has about 70,000 lead service lines that lead to homes, and the city began an initiative to spend $3.4 million to replace lines that serve schools and daycare centers in 2017.

But when it come to the lines that service homes, the city will only replace pipes if they leak or they present some sort of emergency, said Robert Miranda, a representative for the Freshwater for Life Action Coalition.

Longtime friends Tory Lowe and music producer Godzilla help to bring awareness to Milwaukee’s lead crisis through music. (Photo by Michael M. Santiago/News21)

Going forward, the city plans to spend another $3.4 million to replace 300 lines to service homes. Based on the current replacement plan, it will take more than 233 years to transition the city’s lead pipes to copper.

Lowe and The Midwest Connect said they chose to spread the word about the lead pipes through music because it was the best way to reach a wider audience. The community has embraced the song by liking the group’s Facebook page and sharing the song.

The post Milwaukee native uses music to spread awareness about city’s water problem appeared first on Troubled Water.

Maritza Lopez, 54, has dealt with severe health issues her entire life. She lives near a Superfund site in East Chicago. (Photo by Michael M. Santiago/News21)

EAST CHICAGO, Ind. – Growing up in the Calumet neighborhood of East Chicago, Maritza Lopez, 54, has experienced a significant number of health issues that she believes have been a result of living in a city that has lead-contaminated drinking water. She said she lives in “ground zero.”

East Chicago is populated with mostly low-income black and Latino residents. It has been described as one of the most industrial cities in the United States, surrounded by companies such as Delaware-based chemical company DuPont and BP’s Whiting Refinery.

The Environmental Protection Agency declared the West Calumet Housing Complex a federal Superfund site after finding high levels of lead in the soil over several years. In December 2016, the EPA also found elevated levels of lead in the drinking water in the homes there.

The EPA has temporarily relocated residents while it begins cleanup of the contamination.

Lopez started noticing her health declining drastically when she was 10 years old: She started hemorrhaging out of her nose and mouth. At 12, her doctors said she had severe arthritis throughout her body. In her 20s, she began having heart palpitations and chest pains. By 33, she had worked through two sets of dentures. And between the ages of 33 and 38, Lopez was averaging two to three major surgeries a year.

“My body made tumors,” she told News21. “I had a tumor that just blew up overnight. … It was closing off my breathing.”

“I ended up having a heavy metals test done, and they found mostly lead, arsenic and cadmium in my system.”

The West Calumet Housing Complex was built on a former lead refinery, which for years contaminated the soil and water in the area. The housing complex is a Superfund site, and it was listed on the National Priorities List of worst-contaminated sites in the country in 2009. (Photo by Michael M. Santiago/News21)

Lopez helped to form the Community Advisory Group for the Calumet area after the West Calumet Housing Complex was declared a Superfund site in 2009. The EPA funds the group, and it meets weekly to help inform residents in the surrounding neighborhoods about the contaminated soil and drinking water and what steps they can plan to move forward.

Lopez and state Sen. Lonnie Randolph said the EPA and the city of East Chicago are not doing enough to address the contaminated drinking water.

“I don’t think they really understand and appreciate the seriousness of the situation, and it is a very serious situation,” Randolph said.

Lopez said the EPA has failed to test for other contaminants such as arsenic and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, chemicals that naturally occur in coal.

Lopez is still fighting an ongoing battle with her health. She said her heart stops when it wants. She is anemic, and she suffers from severe headaches.

“I’m standing here by the grace of God and realize it’s to fight this and to be vocal,” she said. “And it’s not really standing, it’s sitting here in my recliner.”

To see the full News21 report on “Troubled Water,” go troubledwater.news21.com on Aug. 14.

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