Protecting Michigan’s Waters: Infrastructure for the Future

The Michigan lame duck legislature is racing to pass attacks on our water before the new legislature and Governor are seated in January. We need all Michigan clean water activists to help fight back by making two quick phone calls, one to your State House Representative and one to your State Senator, asking them to oppose the multiple anti-environment and anti-democratic initiatives that corporate lobbyists have pushed lawmakers to pursue during this backward and unaccountable session.

Each year, 9.4 billion gallons of raw sewage flow into our lakes and rivers from leaking septic systems, but Michigan is the only state in the U.S. without a uniform sanitary code requiring periodic inspections of septic systems.

Last week, Saginaw Township’s wastewater retention and treatment basins overflowed. After just over two inches of rainfall stressed the outdated sewer infrastructure to its failing point, over three million gallons of partially treated sewage was released into the Tittabawassee River.