View from a grass-roots table:  people coming together to cope with Flint water
Apr30

View from a grass-roots table: people coming together to cope with Flint water

By Teddy Robertson We sit in a rectangle of tables, old manila file folders halved and then creased so we can write our names and prop them up in front of us. I’ve found my way to the basement of the Unitarian Universalist church for the meeting of a group called Communication/Publication. It’s something to do with water and print media. Jan [Worth-Nelson, EVM editor] has asked me to find out what’s going on. Is there a role for East...

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Turn on the taps first two weeks of May, water officials implore Flint residents
Apr29

Turn on the taps first two weeks of May, water officials implore Flint residents

By Nic Custer Flint residents are being asked to run cold water through their systems daily for two weeks starting Sunday, May 1. The goal is to push out lead trapped in the system by getting a higher velocity of water running through the water pipes, especially in interior plumbing, according to Environmental Protection Agency Region 5 Acting Administrator Robert Kaplan. Kaplan explained the situation and the flushing protocol at...

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Commentary:  It’s not the city charter…it’s the people
Apr27

Commentary: It’s not the city charter…it’s the people

By Paul Rozycki After several weeks of high profile hearings, criminal charges, and the governor guzzling Flint’s water, perhaps the greatest risk for the average citizen has been the danger of being poked in the eye by someone pointing a finger at someone else, as the Flint water crisis unfolds. Whatever the resolution of the criminal charges, studies, and investigations, others are looking to Flint’s future with a different...

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Village Life: Primal scream, anybody?  This is going on too long
Apr25

Village Life: Primal scream, anybody? This is going on too long

By Jan Worth-Nelson I was warned: I had Kleenex at the ready. Still, when my tears started up in the dark during Flint Youth Theater’s production of “The Most (Blank) City in America” Saturday night at the Elgood Theater, they hit me like a squall. I was crying for this beleaguered, heartbreaking, devastated town. And for all of us entangled in its travails. Andrew Morton’s powerful, participatory play, framed around the...

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St. John Street neighborhood remembered by McCree Theater’s Winfrey
Apr14

St. John Street neighborhood remembered by McCree Theater’s Winfrey

By Robert R. Thomas Charles Winfrey, Executive Director of the McCree Theatre, once wrote a play titled “The Saints of St. John Street” based on his fondest memories of growing up in Flint’s St. John Street neighborhood. He told his audience of 40 at the Flint Public Library recently he felt somewhat outside his comfort zone presenting history rather than a play. He noted his discomfort was heightened by the lack of research material...

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