Tagged: detroit water and sewerage department

Highland Park’s mayor say the city’s water treatment plan will remain shut down indefinitely, while crews are working to repair serious problems that have plagued the facility for months.

Problems range from accumulating sludge to non-functioning valves and water meters. Windom says water quality has not been affected, but the problems are so pervasive that he shut the plant down pre-emptively.

Highland Park mayor DeAndre Windom says while the repairs are ongoing, the Detroit water and sewerage department will provide water directly to Highland Park residents.

The Detroit City Council has unanimously rejected a controversial contract to overhaul the city’s water department.

Department officials wanted to award a $48 million contract to Minneapolis-based EMA Consultants.

The company proposed to lay off about 80% of the department’s workforce, in what officials called a necessary move to halt future rate increases.

But critics said the plan would do little more than gut and privatize the water system.

The Detroit City Council has delayed voting on a contract to restructure the city’s water department.

Detroit’s board of water commissioners and Mayor Dave Bing have already approved a plan to contract Minneapolis-based EMA Consulting.

That firm plans to cut up to 80% of the water department’s workforce, and create “efficiencies” by privatizing many so-called “non-core” functions.

But after hearing public concern and anger about the plan, the Council decided to postpone a vote on the $48 million EMA contract.

In part, that’s because the Environmental Protection Agency asked the city not to take action before it can review the plan.

Councilman Ken Cockrel Junior says he want to hear from the EPA before moving ahead.

“The EPA has said they want 45 days to review that contract, and make sure there are no negative impacts,” Cockrel said. “I think when you have a federal agency that is charged with monitoring environmental quality for our country, and they say they need to look at this…I think we need to give them the time to do it.”

Detroit’s water department has been under a federal judge’s oversight since 1977, for periodic failures to comply with the Clean Water Act.

Detroit’s former water department head has pleaded guilty to a conspiracy charge.

Victor Mercado had been a co-defendant in ex-Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s ongoing public corruption case.

Mercado is one of the four people who, along with the former mayor, his longtime friend Bobby Ferguson, and father Bernard Kilpatrick, made up the alleged “Kilpatrick Enterprise.”

Mount Clemens in southeastern Michigan has been honored for the best drinking water.

The Macomb Daily says Mount Clemens recently received the nod from the Michigan branch of the American Water Works Association. The competition was conducted by a state engineer, and three judges graded the city's water and others on clarity, taste and odor.

Mount Clemens water comes from Lake St. Clair. The city has its own water department and doesn't rely on Detroit, a major supplier of water to the suburbs.

34 striking Detroit water department workers have been suspended and will be fired, the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department confirmed Tuesday.

The workers believed to have initiated the strike were notified by letter from DWSD director Sue McCormick, according to a statement issued by the water department.

Defying a federal judge’s order, Detroit water department workers continued to strike Monday night.

Many rank-and-file workers at Detroit’s wastewater treatment plant walked off the job after AFSCME Local 207 member authorized a strike Sunday.

Workers say the strike is a last stand against what they call attempts to dismantle the city’s water department—and the union.

DETROIT (AP) - Employees of the Detroit-area water system that serves four in 10 Michigan residents have gone on strike to protest plans to eliminate most of their jobs through privatization or other measures.

The union for 950 employees of the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department says its members went on strike about 10 a.m. Sunday, setting up a picket line at a wastewater treatment plant in southwest Detroit's Delray neighborhood.