Dear friends,
Water is life and access to clean water is — like everything else in our society — rife with inequity.
Late last month, both houses of Congress introduced legislation to improve water access and safety. The bill would create a funding model to support water well systems for rural residences and allocate more money to programs that prevent lead contamination in institutional settings like schools.
[T]he WATER Act would also provide a $35 billion annual trust fund for urgently-needed drinking water and sewer infrastructure improvements; would address water contamination related to lead and per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS); would direct grants to low-income communities to stem water shutoffs due to unaffordable bills; and would create up to one million well-paying jobs per year.
Please sign the petition to Congress to support the WATER Act. This is a ready-made action.
My immediate family of three is composed entirely of water nerds. I say this with pride. Two of us have taught in field settings about water infrastructure and two of us have published work on the subject. The most serious water aficionado in the family has multiple publications on the subject.
And while I’m the only member of the family who has not risked arrest and been arrested for their water/climate activism, none of us have faced anything like the risks of the Indigenous Water Protectors who are trying to stop the Line 3 tar sands pipeline. The Water Protectors, who are mostly women, have been wrestled to the ground, arrested, and jailed in crowded cells and the police in Northern Minnesota have been funded by Enbridge, the company building the pipeline.
Ask anyone working to oppose Enbridge’s Line 3 pipeline project in any capacity in Northern Minnesota, and they will tell you they’ve been followed by cops while driving alone. Most will tell you they’ve been intimidated—verbally, physically, or both. Some will tell you they suspect they are being surveilled. Others report violence and brutality.
“The police presence has been strong,” said Tara Houska, a tribal attorney and founder of Giniw Collective, a frontline group resisting the pipeline through direct action. “We’ve seen groups of squad cars 20-plus strong from different counties guarding the line. Last week a car followed us for two hours straight.”
The intersection of abusive police power and corporate extraction makes this situation doubly untenable (actually, I’m not sure you can double untenability).
Please write a letter to President Biden to call on him to Stop Line 3. This a ready-made action.
The hoarding of life-saving resources for the powerful and privileged is much in the news this week. In DC, a hospital COO named Anosh Ahmed misused vaccine doses, intended for people who are elderly or institutionalized or working as teachers. Over 70 employees at Trump International Hotel & Tower (where Ahmed owns a condo) received the vaccines instead, along with employees at his favorite steak house and watch store, and also Eric Trump, if Ahmed’s boast is to be believed. ET has declined to comment.
In addition to our governor’s metastasizing sexual harassment and nursing home scandals, it emerged that early in the pandemic, he was arranging for scarce coronavirus tests for family and friends. No one seems surprised. Among us regular folks, this sort of unethical behavior — line jumping and the facilitating of line-jumping — has trashed friendships.
The work of securing nice things — like health care and clean water, voting rights and basic human rights — for everyone is, you know, a LOT of work. One of the first hurdles is getting attention to unmet needs. The indefatigable activists fighting for fair pay for home care in NY need our support.
Help amplify the demands, thank the co-sponsors, and keep the pressure on to get a NYS budget that serves human needs. There are calls to make and social media action.
The HALT bill, passed by both houses of the NY legislature, will end solitary confinement for vulnerable populations and limit it to 15 or fewer days for all other persons. Few will emerge from the pandemic wondering what the big deal is about keeping people in social isolation. But solitary confinement is debilitating and damaging in ways that are unimaginable. Ian Manuel, who committed a murder at age 13 and spent 18 years in solitary in Florida, has written a book about his experience and is now out of prison and working as an activist to end cruel and unusual punishment.
I also witnessed the human consequences of the harshness of solitary firsthand: Some people would resort to cutting their stomachs open with a razor and sticking a plastic spork inside their intestines just so they could spend a week in the comfort of a hospital room with a television. Just so they could have a semblance of freedom. Just so they could feel human again.
The HALT bill, a piece of humane and long-overdue legislation, is still awaiting the governor’s signature.
Call on the governor to sign the Humane Alternatives to Long-Term Solitary Confinement Act (HALT), S.2836.
Thank you for staying with the hard work. Have a great weekend!
with love,
L