Ludington City Council December 5th, 2016: Pageantry and Plumbing

[XLFD]

The Ludington City Council meeting had an agenda aimed more at pageantry than action, perhaps taking a cue from the Miss Ludington Area pageant over the weekend.  Each of the three 'communications' had representatives present to emphasize their own group. 

Vic Burwell, who introduced the council to the Mason County Sports Hall of Fame move to the downtown last year encouraged the council and community to get involved with this year's annual lake jump, as it would benefit his enterprise. 

Kara Rose-Dragun then went over the details of the second proposed year of Statford on the Avenue at the Rotary Park bandshell (to be held the last weekend in August and the first weekend in September) including the logistics of shutting down the street that bisects the park.  They will once again offer some classic theater, not necessarily just Shakespeare.

Barry Neal of the House of Flavors had Mayor Pro Tem elect Kaye Holman read a proclamation and designate a special "Ice Cream Day" in the city of Ludington to mark the anniversary of the Ludington ice cream manufacturer's successful world record effort to produce the largest ice cream dessert (likely to be short lived, as another Michigan company did the same, but bigger, later last year.

In 1984, President Ronald Reagan proclaimed July as National Ice Cream Month and established National Ice Cream Day as the third Sunday in the month of July, so enjoy two ice cream days next year Ludingtonians.

In personnel actions, the council ratified unanimously the tentative agreement with the police union, and had a first reading raising the pay rates of the Clerk and Treasurer for next year by 1.5%, to $57,565 and $51,127 respectively.  This does not include the benefit rates over 70% that the council voted on at the last meeting to sustain.

The only other planned business was to do the formalities that allowed waste from Ludington (and the rest of Mason County) to now be deposited in Wexford County landfills, if needed, and to do the approval of the consent of easement holder for some of Strait's Steel & Wire contaminated property to allow it to be once again repurposed for non-residential uses.  They otherwise, cancelled the planned special meeting on December 8th.

As far as public comment, I was the only one to comment at the beginning of the meeting (at the 3:00 mark) and then at the end I continued my discussion on the lead situation in Ludington (at the 27:55 mark).  Vic Burwell did get up just after I did (30:25) to remind the councilors of all the positive and progressive things they do, and how they rarely get the chance to hear positive things at these meetings. 

It really seems odd to me that they only get these accolades from other city officials and those who are part of those that benefit from the city's actions (as Burwell's Floracraft and Mason County Sports Hall of Fame has received on numerous occasions).  Whenever these speakers toss off compliments to the city officials it comes off as lame and sycophantic, especially when it is not referring to anything specific the city has actually done. 

A transcript of my two related comments follows the video.  Councilor Rathsack asked the chair what my first comment had to do with agenda items, and the mayor correctly reminded him that I had commented on the contents of the minutes of the last meeting, which up to that point in the meeting hadn't been approved. 

December 5th, 2016 Ludington City Council meeting from Mason County District Library on Vimeo.

(3:00) "The minutes from the last meeting has Councilor Winczewski telling us that it is pretty obvious there is no lead in the city water.  A statement like that is very misleading, being that the last two lead monitoring tests have shown there is, and the two taps at Ludington schools above the Maximum Contaminant Level are counter-examples to the councilor’s statement. 

Yet, despite this evidence to the contrary, the councilor, John Shay, and the Water Plant Supervisor have all declared that there is no lead in the Ludington water system.  Many taps that are still in service at these schools had significantly high levels of lead, but were not above the action level, indicating that there is lead added somewhere between the time it leaves the water plant, supposedly lead-free, and arrives at the schools.

The methodology of the tests at the schools is clear, they took water from the various taps with what's called a ‘first draw’, therefore they were able to detect that the lead solder or piping was close to the tap itself at the two taps that tested too high.    But then these tests would be insufficient to detect lead solder or pipe contamination further down the line, since the water being contaminated in that case would never be detected using this method, as the most tainted water samples could take a minute or more to reach the tap. 

Therefore, any level of lead in the water at our schools, and each school had at least two taps with over 1 part per billion up to 34 ppb, indicates that lead is being introduced somewhere along the supply line.  Therefore, contrary to our councilor, who was a chemistry teacher at Ludington schools and should know better, it is pretty obvious there is lead in the city water system, and pretty obvious that city officials are trying to suppress that knowledge.  I invite and insist that if John Shay or anybody else in the city's water department wants to claim otherwise, to publicly state that all of the supply lines that the city owns are definitely lead-free, and support that statement with documentation. 

Anything less will make it pretty obvious that the city manager, city councilor, and water plant supervisor are not only fooling themselves, but lying to the public." 

(27:55):  "I once again go to methodology to explain how the City has for years tried to unlawfully downplay the lead in city water.  This is a scheme that dates back to the early nineties, shortly after the Safe Drinking Water Act made testing mandatory for water suppliers.  Kurt Malzahn recently explained what is supposed to happen to the paper saying that the samples are taken in homes built before 1986 to see if the water is aggressive enough to leach lead from pipes and solder.  

And that should be the case. but 19% of the 21 homes being tested by the city every three years were built after 1986, when lead-free fixtures and solder were mandated by law in constructions.  Somehow, these homes were added to a list that should have been made up exclusively of older homes with lead pipes or lead-soldered pipes.  How can these homes determine whether lead leaching has occurred if they don't have lead pipes, solder, or fixtures to begin with?  

Likewise, the test samples are taken by the homeowners who will likely use the 'first draw' method which as noted will only detect lead leaching near the tap itself.  Most people have replaced their kitchen and bathroom fixtures over the last 30 years with new lead-free fixtures, so there should be only traces of lead detected by the first draw method even if their basement is teeming with lead and old copper pipes. 

Test protocols also suggest at least six hours of non-use of the house's water system before getting samples.  This is difficult if not impossible for some families, particularly when you go down the list of homes tested and find that many of the houses tested are city officials or former officials, like John Shay, Mark Barnett, Dave Wroble, Mary Reeds Mortensen, etc. who can only benefit from a negative finding for lead."

Both Councilor Winczewski and Councilor Krauch weighed in on those comments at the end of the meeting in ways that deserve a closer look to gauge how ridiculous and irresponsible they were on the behalf of the utility they manage and which they effectively serve on the "board of directors'" thereof.  Please go to (Led Ed for Lud Lords) to see the full analysis of this topic.

The revelation that the lead-tested homes were comprised of a significant amount of homes built after lead-free laws were enacted, and that many were the houses of city officials, who would have a potential conflict of interest in conducting the tests fairly, were significant and will be passed along to the public and the MDEQ. 

[John Doe Jr]

When you don't want to bother people choking on lead-water you just use your own clean tap.

[John Doe Jr]

Why would Holman run for Mayor if she can barely get through the thinking and process of a meeting?   This meeting she was clearly out of it. Good thing she sits between all the answers.

[XLFD]

The two 'answers' she sits between will be doing the same during the next four years on more than just meeting protocol.  Kaye is a desirable mayor from their vantage point because of her qualities.

[Brad]

I think the CC/CM use the lead to protect themselves from their Kryptonite......

...you.

I believe I heard on news that MI congress is putting bill thru to require all MI cities to step up water testing...?  Trying to find it....

And Thanks X!

[XLFD]

If I'm kryptonite, it is the red variety.  If you are not familiar with Superman lore, red kryptonite is a mineral from the planet Krypton that removes inhibitions from Kryptonians and Ludington officials alike making them reckless, evil, and dangerous.

I believe the state legislators are pushing bills through the congress to change lead testing to make it more meaningful for public health and safety.  When you can have a water utility test a significant portion of homes built after 1986, test a significant portion of homes that are owned by their agency members, and have lead water coolers still in the schools that should have been gone 25 years ago, something is amiss.

[AQUAMAN]

Well, it would seem to me that the MDEQ wouldn't want the same repeated tests on the same homes, and wait for three years to see if the results are differing. The COL could ask for volunteer homeowners to get tests too, or didn't they even think of this? Also, if they found tests from certain homes to be contaminated with lead, then those should be retested until the problem is cleared up, with follow-ups routinely, not every three years either. Then, out of what, thousands of homes, only 19 get tests? Why so few? Shouldn't a valid test be of at least 10% or more of homes? Lastly, I noticed another "temper tantrum" on X by CC Krauch, and for no other reason than to undermine his findings, and being public about the issues before the entire citizenship. I find him to be nauseating and unprofessional in his conduct, not to mention childish. I guess I'm beginning to understand why he retired so early as an attorney, as he has no calm demeanor in his character at his age anymore, which is another reason he has no business on the council to begin with imho.

[XLFD]

If the intent by the City of Ludington was to make sure that the water would not react with the lead that still exists in people's homes, and our public schools, you would think they would set these tests in houses that have lead pipes or lead-soldered copper pipes made before 1986. 

But in selecting several homes built after 1986 against protocol, and selecting city officials home for the most part, they show that isn't in their sights; they want to pass the tests, they could care less whether some people are swilling lead.  Further evidence of this is their unsubstantiated defense of the city's own pipes, even when nobody from the COL will take up my challenge to state that their supply lines are lead-free.