Detroit’s Water Shutoff is Just Not Right

It takes only a few days for a human to die from dehydration. And Detroit, in an effort to collect more water bills, has turned off water to citizens who have not payed said bills. Does the fact that these people haven’t payed money for water make it right to deprive them of it? Shouldn’t water be free for everyone?

In a perfect world, yes. That being said, we don’t live in a perfect world. In fact we are very far from it. But why should something so simple become unavailable for one of the poorest cities in the USA?

The answer? Money. Detroit has dug itself into a bankruptcy hole. Now it’s trying to climb out, doing whatever it can to juice money from its citizens.

Nearly 45 per cent of the city’s 173,000 residential accounts were considered past due in late August. Now 350 to 400 households’ water is being shut off everyday. I don’t think this is right, starving people of water for the sake of a bill that they just can’t afford to pay. Water should be free and available to every person, everywhere.

Photo credit to Mary Schroeder, Detroit Free Press

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