Like the proverbial bad house guest, it just won’t go away.
Try as we might, we can’t seem to avoid the microcystin-induced mania that has gripped our fair metropolis over the past solid month. What is a civic-minded li’l column like ours to do?
This is our final attempt to bring clarity to the matter. We do so in the form of a pop quiz, multiple choice style. See how well you have been paying attention to the information overload.
Inquiring minds want to know
1. Lake Erie is:
A. a major shipping channel;
B. an important location for the sport fishing and recreational boating industries;
C. an endpoint for a massive drainage system that moves water off millions of acres of land;
or D. a dynamic ecosystem that changes rapidly and is on the verge of collapse due to the lack of respect given it?
Given the rhetoric surrounding the crisis, you’re forgiven if you didn’t know the best answer is “D.” If you listen to the pols braying you’d swear the Lake was mostly a place for human economic activity. Which has brought in exotic animals that have wreaked havoc on its natural balance, artificial nutrients that have changed its biochemistry, and countless tons of silt and sediment clogging its flow.
Unless we all remember those points, the “verge of collapse” part of the answer will soon change from the future to the past tense. As in “collapsed.”
2. Which of the following is most carefully monitored and tested by the Environmental Protection Agency:
A. Toledo municipal drinking water;
or B. bottled water?
The correct answer is, yeah right, you gotta be kidding me. Bottled water isn’t even regulated by the EPA, but by the Food and Drug Administration, which has few requirements on its healthfulness or lack thereof. Some bottled water is simply bottled tap water anyway. While Toledo water is tested several times a day at multiple points along the distribution system, bottled water is typically tested only once a week for bacterial contamination and once annually for organic chemicals.
There is no requirement for bottled water to be disinfected, filtered, derived from a protected source, or tested by certified chemists in certified labs, while Toledo must meet all those requirements. While Toledo is subject to careful EPA monitoring, bottled water companies need not forward their results to the EPA, and there is no public “right to know” of any contamination. What’s in your water? Good luck finding out.
3. Toledo’s drinking water is:
A. a way to control the region by controlling Toledo’s suburban neighbors;
or B. an invaluable resource essential to economic and literal survival.
Carty, if you’re reading this, the answer is not what you think. See, the Finkly One viewed Toledo water as an essential way to throw his kingly weight around. Meanwhile the Toledo system has been expanded out into the region to the point that the water treatment plant is often very near capacity, meaning incoming water doesn’t get treated very long. Shorter treatment means greater risk of contaminants making it out of the plant, like, gulp, microcystin toxin.
The answer, Carty notwithstanding, is definitely “B.”
4: The Toledo drinking water emergency was:
A. exactly like 9/11;
B. caused by a predictable algal bloom;
or C. caused by an unpredictable change in the testing protocol demanded by the EPA.
Hizzoner Unca Dennis unfortunately got this one wrong, stating it was like 9/11. Seriously, Mayor, they were single-celled organisms, not terrorist cells, and no one died. Is the answer then “B” or “C?”
Seems like both. Toledo’s Department of Public Utilities has blamed both the algae, which arrive every year, and the state regulators, which seem to be a lot sneakier and more suspect. Apparently they changed the requirements on August 1st, and lo and behold, the microcystin was in full blown toxic mode!
Or was it? After a day of “no drink, no wash” and wrangling over the proper testing protocol, a new requirement was issued, and what d’ya know? The microcystin had shrunk back to normal.
Algal bloom or misplaced doom and gloom? You be the judge.
Come Hildo or high water
Now to the most important question of all. Which of the following is the best source of information about any of the foregoing matters?
Forget the multiple choice here, the clear answer would be “none of the above.” The City has been so inept it didn’t put out alerts in any language but English. The mainstream media worked itself into such a lather that reporters were interviewing other reporters. A virally cynical social media scare caused a run on bottled water when tap water was consistently testing safe. Where can you turn for the bald-faced troof?
Face it, kiddeez. These are desperate times. And desperate times call for desperate people.
As always, we are at your service.
