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Across the state people are asking, “What happened to our water?” Michiganders are demanding answers, and they’re not alone.
The supporting census data, however, is fragmentary and inconclusive.
It also doesn’t tell us why these communities still lack access to water and sanitation in the 21st Century, and what we can do about it.
To find answers to those questions, my organization, DigDeep, with support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, just launched an unprecedented “hotspot study” of water and sanitation issues around the country.
“Fixing the problem must involve building a better understanding of who lacks accessible, affordable and safe water and sanitation.
Meanwhile, researchers from DigDeep and the US Water Alliance will embed themselves inside six communities struggling with water and sanitation issues to better understand these challenges in their local context.
Working closely with local partners, researchers will conduct interviews, community meetings, and intensive field work to provide depth and texture to the MSU data.
The study has three primary goals: create a national understanding of the water-access problem; identify promising, scalable community-focused models for providing universal access to running water and indoor plumbing; and develop recommendations for the policies and funding necessary to extend water access to all Americans.
Uncovering the hard data on this persistent problem is the first, crucial step toward closing the water-access gap in America.