Two proposals unveiled last week by a trio of House and Senate lawmakers from Michigan would respond to the crisis in Flint by expanding public reporting requirements related to the results of lead testing and by offering hundreds of millions of dollars to help the community replace lead-contaminated pipes.
Announced jointly by Michigan Democratic Sens. Gary Peters and Debbie Stabenow, and Rep. Dan Kildee (D-Mich.), Flint’s representative in Congress, the first bill (S. 2466, the “Improving Notification for Clean and Safe Drinking Water Act”) would update federal law to require communities to notify the public whenever lead monitoring activities detect “any exceedance of a lead action level or any other prescribed level of lead” regulated by the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA). Additionally, the bill would direct EPA to notify the public about concentrations of lead in the water system discovered through monitoring if the state does not do so in a timely manner. EPA would also be allowed to notify any water utility customer of “any result of lead monitoring conducted by a public water system.”
Peters, Stabenow and Kildee also offered another proposal last week as an amendment to a comprehensive energy bill under consideration in the Senate. The measure would authorize up to $400 million for a new emergency infrastructure program under the SDWA to help Flint “replace or fix lead-contaminated water pipes, to hire new personnel, and to cover the cost of technical assistance provided by the EPA.” The State of Michigan would be required to provide a dollar-for-dollar match to EPA’s funding, and the measure would also allow the state to forgive Flint’s outstanding Drinking Water State Revolving Fund debts. Another section of the proposal would authorize a $200 million Center of Excellence on Lead Exposure to monitor the health of individuals exposed to lead and connect them with a variety of available services.
It is unclear whether Senate Republicans will allow a vote on the funding measure during consideration of the energy bill. Some have expressed concern with the proposal, including Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.), who was quoted last week warning against giving the community a “blank check” to repair infrastructure that should be the “primary responsibility” of the city and the state.
Meanwhile last week the Michigan state legislature gave final approval to a supplemental appropriations bill providing $28 million to Flint to help pay for the ongoing response to the lead crisis.