• Water

After Texas Deep Freeze, 74 Lawmakers and 500 Organizations Urge Biden to Back Water Infrastructure Bill

• clean drinking water
• clean water
• lead pipes
• sewer
• water infrastructure

While more than one million Texans are still living without running water, Democratic lawmakers and advocates across the nation are urging President Biden to back a water infrastructure bill that would commit $35 billion to update and climate-proof the nation’s water infrastructure. 

Why This Matters: The Guardian reports that a majority of water and waste systems in the U.S. are unprepared to deal with the increasing impacts of climate change.

• Water

One Million CA Residents Exposed to Dirty Drinking Water

• agricultural workers
• Central Valley
• drinking water
• Flint
• Infrastructure
• low income communities
• safe drinking water
• water infrastructure

The NY Times published a blistering exposé yesterday, in which it reported that “more than 300 public water systems in California serve unsafe drinking water, according to public compliance data compiled by the California State Water Resources Control Board” with “more than one million Californians exposed to unsafe water each year, according to public health officials.”   

• Climate Change

Water Infrastructure Crumbling Under Climate Change Pressures

• Green New Deal
• Hurricane Maria
• Lake Okeechobee
• levees
• Midwestern floods
• Puerto Rico
• water infrastructure

The U.S. flood control system of levees and dams are worn out and not up to the threat that climate change is posing them.  On Sunday, The New York Times reported that across the flooded Midwest, the vaunted federal levee system that was supposed to protect towns and farmland from devastating floods “is now so full of holes that many [there] ruefully describe it as ‘Swiss cheese,’” leaving many areas without flood protection at all.