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Monday, July 10th, 2023

Decades after the dangers of lead became clear, some cities are leaving lead pipe in the ground

Author:     MICHAEL PHILLIS
Source:     Associated Press
Publication Date:     July 8, 2023 | 9:19 PM PDT
 Link: Decades after the dangers of lead became clear, some cities are leaving lead pipe in the ground
Stephan:  

I increasingly think of the United States as an aged formerly heavily muscled action hero now gone to seed and in poor health. From the 1930s to the 1960s we created a middle class that was the envy of the world, built colleges that made us the technological leader of the world, and created an infrastructure of bridges, railroads, and interstate highways that were without equal. But then the maintenance that fostered wellbeing that made us a world leader ended, and instead we shifted our priorities to fostering the rise of the uber-rich and, today, all the triumphs of those 30 years have been left to decay and we are now, like the former action hero a country decayed and in ill-health. Nowhere is this clearer than in the scandal of a water system still using lead pipes, as this article describes.

A worker holds a section of the lead piping he is replacing with the copper pipe. Credit: Charles Krupa / AP

PROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND — Prandy Tavarez and his wife were expecting a baby when they bought a four-bedroom house in a well-kept neighborhood of century-old homes here. They got to work making it theirs, ripping off wallpaper, upgrading the electrical and replacing windows coated in paint that contained lead, a potent neurotoxin that can damage brain development in children.

That wasn’t the only lead. The pipe carrying water to their home was made of it, too. Providence’s tap water had had dangerous lead levels for years. So it wasn’t surprising in 2008 when a road crew came through and dug up the street to take out the pipe. Then they left part of it in the ground.

“They put on a Band-Aid,” Tavarez said.

Around the country, utilities have been leaving lead pipe in the ground even when it is easiest to remove during water main work. Worse, they have been removing sections, disturbing the pipe and leaving the […]

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