“A boil advisory has been issued for the following communities…”
This decree is made on countless news broadcasts across Louisiana regularly, and we need to have a discussion about the infrastructural deficiencies surrounding these warnings.
The Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals is responsible for administering these advisories, and its reports are usually murky on the concrete reasons behind why the boil advisory has been put into place.
For example, in a recent boil advisory concerning the St. Joseph Water System in Tensas Parish, the standard warning of “problems with the water supply system” was the only explanation given for the advisory. The report quickly turns to instructing readers how to make water safe for consumption.
This report was not an anomaly. Leaving customers uninformed about the safety of their water systems seems to be the rule rather than the exception.
This method of sheltering potential dangers is understandable to a degree because mass hysteria about the water supply is not in the best interests of the state. However, if there are underlying infrastructure issues leading to almost daily boil advisories in some parishes, it is Louisiana’s duty to inform and alleviate those issues.
You can look to New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu’s recent announcement concerning the upgrades to New Orleans’ water system as a template for proactive governmental action.
In the next six to nine months, New Orleans will complete upgrades costing “about $3 million” and lead to major reductions in incidences of boil advisories in the city. According to WWL/Channel 4, this is just the first part of a “$3.3 billion capital improvement program comprised of over 600 projects across New Orleans.”
New Orleans is a special case, as some of these repairs stem from damage caused by Hurricanes Katrina and Isaac. Therefore, portions of this funding come from recovery funds and other federal investments.
The rest of the state does not find itself with the same federal funding to use in upgrading its water systems.
What do exist are Louisiana’s federally elected officials who can commit themselves to passing President Obama’s National Infrastructure Reinvestment Bank. As described in an American Progress’ report on the bill, “A federal lending authority could allow for drinking and clean water infrastructure investments to be coordinated with the expansion of electrical capacity required to support them.”
This would address a major issue, as power surges to compensate for the population these systems were never expected to handle cripple these systems and lead to boil advisories.
To his credit, Republican Sen. David Vitter worked with the Obama administration to cajole his Republican House counterparts to see past their ignorant views on government spending so they can better advocate for the communities they claim to represent.
Once Gov. Jindal hands the keys of the Governor’s Mansion to whomever finds themselves in the executive office in November, they must make an impassioned case for all investments possible to alleviate our current water systems’ ailing health.
Garrett Hines is a 21-year-old political science senior from Monroe, Louisiana. You can reach him on Twitter @garrettH_TDR.