by Brenda Sutherlin
While we all get thirsty, there are some things that we should not drink. For the people of Jackson, Mississippi, who get their drinking water from the Pearl River, this is their dilemma. There is an ongoing water usage problem because of the contaminants in the water. But who can help but wonder what happened and why?
In January 2022, the Jackson Clarion-Ledger published a report containing problems associated with the water treatment plant and listed the following problems, ‘old and leaky pipes, insufficient money for repairs, malfunctions at the treatment plants and staffing.”
Torrential rains during the month of August 2022 caused a significant amount of pressure on the dams and levees preventing them to be able to handle the flooding of the Pearl River.
“The Pearl River ranks 4th in freshwater discharge among the rivers draining into the Gulf of Mexico. This river provides drinking water to hundreds of thousands of residents in Metropolitan Jackson, Mississippi.” https://www.americanrivers.org/river/pearl-river
Chokwe Lumumba, the Mayor of Jackson, declared a water system emergency, saying that, “the flooding of the Pearl River created problems with treating water at the O.B. Curtis Water Plant, which was already damaged, leading to a temporary decrease in pressure in the production of clean water throughout the City of Jackson.”
Lumumba said that the city of Jackson received $40 million dollars for water-treatment repairs, but that amount was not sufficient and only repaired and replaced some of the badly needed infrastructures. He said that $8 million dollars were spent on one pipe. He also said that it would take more than a billion dollars to repair the system for it to reach its maximum running capacity.
In a similar situation, the citizens of Morgan and Lawrence County in North Alabama have experienced what it means to have unsafe drinking water. The Alabama Department of Environmental Management (ADEM) reported in 2016 that a local chemical company dumped dangerous chemicals in the drinking water in these counties going as far back as 2002.
A group of man-made chemicals Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and Perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS) were detected at 110ppt in West Morgan-East Lawrence Water and Sewer Authority, above the 70ppt EPA chronic exposure threshold.
One hundred thousand people in North Alabama were advised not to drink the water from their taps due to elevated levels of these contaminants. They were advised not to use the water for drinking, cooking, or bathing.
At the time, this seemed like the greatest inconvenience that could happen. But this is nothing compared to what the citizens of Jackson, Mississippi must live with now. At best, the people of North Alabama could flush their toilets. The people of Jackson, Mississippi can neither drink, bathe, nor flush.
Calhoun students may not think this would be a concern for them, but this dilemma can effect anyone who relies on public water systems. The public water system management of each county or each municipality should be held accountable for safe drinking water for their citizens.