Nancy Colas is a small business owner from Newburgh, New York. She and her family tested above the Environmental Protection Agency’s maximum level for perfluorooctanesulfonic acid last year. (Photo by Elissa Nuñez/News21)

NEWBURGH, N.Y. – When Newburgh’s city manager declared a state of emergency last year after tests found dangerous levels of perfluorooctanesulfonic acid in the city’s water supply, Nancy Colas scheduled blood tests for everyone in her family.

“My 17-year-old, he pretty much grew up here, and he’s been drinking that water all his life,”  she said.

The Colas family tested well above the the maximum level allowed by the Environmental Protection Agency. PFOS, a dangerous chemical found in firefighting foam, has been linked to cancer and other medical problems.

“There are effects that I wonder how it’s going to affect us down the line,” Colas said. “Cognitively, are my children going to be OK as they get older?”

Newburgh, a poor city filled with black and Latino residents, is one of many communities of color whose water has been contaminated by nearby Superfund or hazardous waste sites. In this case, the Stewart Air National Guard Base leaked PFOS into the town’s lakes and reservoirs.

Colas, like a growing number of Newburgh residents, is suing the city of Newburgh for negligence, contending that city officials were long aware of the problem before they declared a state of emergency, putting residents at greater risk of illness.

“It hurts to know that they knew, and they didn’t say anything,” she said. “I’m sure there are people that knew.”

And much like other Newburgh residents, Colas also thinks that had she lived in a different town or been born a different race, she would’ve never been exposed to PFOS.

“It is an environmental justice issue because if we were sitting in Deer Park, Long Island, I don’t think it would have ever been an issue,” Colas said. “I don’t think there would have been contamination, period. Because someone would have said ‘not in my backyard.’”

The Hudson River runs alongside the city of Newburgh. (Photo by Elissa Nuñez/News21)––≠

Many residents, including city officials, said the Department of Defense would be more motivated to clean up the Superfund site if Newburgh were a whiter, more affluent town.

“It certainly feels like that might be part of it, because why are they ignoring us?” said Genie Abrams, a Newburgh City Council member. “Are they ignoring other communities, the wealthier communities, the whiter communities?

Some residents said town meetings meant to update residents are poorly publicized. Many still haven’t been blood tested, specifically in the Spanish-speaking community. The city government has posted materials in both Spanish and Creole on its website, but community activists said it’s not enough.

“For this level of danger, there should be letters being sent out to every single home periodically to update, and that’s not happening in English and Spanish,” said Kevindaryan Lujan, a Newburgh resident. “So this is an issue the community is concerned about. And there’s whole bulks of the community that are unaware of what’s going on.”

The state Department of Environmental Conservation is working to complete a multimillion dollar filtration plant to treat Newburgh’s poisoned water by October. State officials and environmental experts are pressing the Department of Defense to clean up contamination at the Superfund site.

“The federal and the state government have really been passing the buck to each other on this issue, no one really wants to take care of it,” Lujan said. “It’s kind of being put under the rug, and people are still scared.”

Newburgh will return to its original water supply in the fall when the filtration plant is fully constructed. “We need to have clean water here, it’s a basic human right for anyone, no matter what your income level is,” Abrams said.

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.

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When it comes to improving water quality, Indiana University professor David Konisky said progress has been uneven – especially for “communities of color or low-income where the investments or the politics” are not evenly spread. (Photo by Brandon Kitchin/News21)

PHOENIX  – Poor and minority communities have long suffered from a disproportionate share of harmful environmental problems, such as contaminated water and polluted air.

And one Indiana University associate professor fears those environmental justice issues will only get worse under President Donald Trump.

David Konisky, who researches politics and public policy and focuses on environmental justice issues, said President Barack Obama had started making progress on the issues. But they don’t seem to rank high under the new Trump administration, he said.

“Following the election of president Trump and the appointment of Scott Pruitt to head the (Environmental Protection Agency), these positive developments are at risk of being reversed,” he wrote in an article published in The Conversation. “There is a clear signal being sent in the proposed budget.”

Under Trump’s proposed budget, the environmental justice program within the EPA could see a decrease of funding of 78 percent, dropping its financial resources from $6.7 million to $1.5 million, according to an article in The Oregonian.

Konisky told News21 that the proposed move could hurt communities often targeted because of race or socioeconomic status.

When it comes to water quality specifically, Konisky said progress has been uneven – especially for “communities of color or low-income where the investments or the politics” are not evenly spread.

He said while it’s important for the federal government to address environmental justice issues, the states must step up their efforts when the federal government lags.

But it’s not just about the environment, he said.

“It speaks to economics,” he said. “It speaks to social structures. It speaks to politics. And this is frankly what makes it so challenging for an agency like the EPA or a state environmental agency.

“These are public health agencies. It is their mission to protect human health and the environment.”

He said community and nonprofit organizations also play an influential role in advocating for changes in the places that need the most help.

“There is a very active environmental justice community,” Konisky said. “Often these are grassroots neighborhood-based organizations where what they lack in financial resources, they make up for with their commitment and their passion and sort of the social capital that they bring in their organization to fight back.”

Officials should focus on proper implementation and enforcement of policies moving forward, he said. However, he said environmental justice issues tends to be complicated.

“When we have so many different governments who are responsible for that, you are likely to get some differences in outcomes because of implementation strategies,” Konisky said. “I actually think we don’t know enough about what works and what doesn’t work, and that’s something which I think certainly requires more attention.”

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