To
address issues both here in the U.S., and in our international community within
the diaspora a clear understanding of how to address issues within our
communities must be understood by each of us as emergency management
professionals.
Monday, November 21, 2016
Systems Approach to community capacity building and resilience.
The Next Flint Water Crisis
https://psmag.com/the-next-flint-water-crisis-6436aa92b053#.tpoiqrmcc
A new study suggests a number of minority American neighborhoods are at risk of having unhealthier water than their white counterparts.
By Francie Diep
Walk through an unincorporated stretch of Wake County outside Raleigh, North Carolina, and it might look just as dense and developed as the town proper. But there’s an important, invisible difference: Folks there may not have access to the city’s municipal water system. Instead, their homes draw from private wells and septic tanks.
While not all unincorporated Wake County communities lack piped water, those that have a larger black population are more likely to depend on wells and septic tanks, according to a 2014 study. “They were excluded probably for historical reasons, during the Jim Crow era,” says University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill environmental researcher Jackie MacDonald Gibson, the leader of the 2014 study.
Now, MacDonald Gibson has a new study that demonstrates the toll that history has had on residents’ health. The kitchen tap water in majority-black Wake County communities that depend on wells is more than 50 times more likely to contain coliform bacteria — and more than 700 times more likely to contain E. coli — than the municipal water that’s available to majority-white neighborhoods just next door.
Flint’s Horrifying Water Crisis Is Bigger Than Just Flint
Flint’s story isn’t just about incompetence and bureaucratic failure; it’s a tragedy of austerity as well.psmag.com
Flint’s story isn’t just about incompetence and bureaucratic failure; it’s a tragedy of austerity as well.psmag.com
The presence of coliform bacteria and E. coli indicates that the water has been contaminated with sewage, which can make people seriously ill. If these neighborhoods had municipal water, MacDonald Gibson and her colleague Frank Stillo estimate that the number of annual emergency room visits for gastrointestinal illnesses in these areas would drop by more than one-fifth.
But leaders both in the city and in unincorporated neighborhoods have been reluctant to extend water service, citing costs, according to a surveypublished last year. “I think there’s a lack of awareness of the water quality problem in these wells,” MacDonald Gibson says. The effective result is that Wake County’s black residents bear a disproportionate burden of gastrointestinal disease there.
This may not be a problem only in North Carolina. Studies have shown that other majority-white Southern towns have refused to annex surrounding, majority-black neighborhoods and to extend municipal services to them. The practice is so common that it has a name: underbounding. Researchers have also documented towns underbounding Hispanic neighborhoods in Texas’ Lower Rio Grande and California’s Central Valley.
The Bureaucratic Malfeasance That Created Flint and Sebring’s Water Crises
What good is a federal agency if it doesn’t help the people it’s supposed to serve?psmag.com
What good is a federal agency if it doesn’t help the people it’s supposed to serve?psmag.com
Poor communities of color in the United States have often had to deal with more pollution than their richer, whiter counterparts. The water crisis in Flint, Michigan, taught us that one way such environmental injustice happens is when officials make poor decisions and ignore residents’ complaints. Wake County shows that underbounding, whether new or historical, might be another way.
Though it’s common knowledge among environmental researchers that well water is often riskier than municipal water, most politicians and community members are not familiar with the dangers. With this new data in hand, perhaps city officials will finally have the information they need to justify the expense of expanding their municipal water system.
Thursday, November 17, 2016
April 2017. AMLFC Institute & 2017 ComplianceAid Caribbean Anti-Money Laundering and Financial Crimes Conference
|
Friday, November 11, 2016
Congratulations: Ibarakumo B. Walson. BEMA International\Lifetime\Nigeria Member
Our
survival depends on us coming together. To put aside our differences, and
ego’s for difficult times are ahead. At times we have to follow,
but know when to lead.
CDS.
CEO. BEMA
Congratulations to BEMA
International\Lifetime\Nigeria member Ibarakumo B. Walson for completing the Ethics
of Humanitarian Work conducted by EDD Integrated Services Ltd,
Nigeria, November 10, 2016.
Ibarakumo is with the Nigerian National Emergency Management
Agency (NEMA, http://nema.gov.ng/ ) assigned
to the Delta Region and has been a member of BEMA since 2014. As I do
with all members of BEMA we converse by telephone whenever possible.
Thank you for such outstanding work you’re
doing for the Delta and Nigeria in planning, preparing, and responding to both
man-made and natural disasters.
Special
Offer:
Because of
your dedication I shall offer 2 FREE International\Lifetime\Nigeria membership
to any of your coworkers that you recommend.
To stress
the importance of us coming together for a common
goal within the diaspora 2 FREE International\Lifetime memberships in BEMA will
be offered to any member of disaster\emergency office\agency\ministry of the
member nations of the Africa Union from November 11, 2016 to December 31, 2016.
Thank you
for giving the incentive to evolve toward an African Descent NGO for
humanitarian aid, disaster response, recovery, and self-sustainability for our
communities. Enough is enough. The Time for Change is Now.
Ibarakumo, Peace be unto you and your family.
Charles
Charles D. Sharp
Chief Executive Officer
Black Emergency Managers Association
|
||
1231 Good Hope Road S.E.
|
||
Washington, D.C. 20020
|
||
Office: 202-618-9097
|
||
bEMA
|
||
Cooperation, Collaboration,
Communication, Coordination, Community engagement, and Partnering (C5&P)
A
501 (c) 3 organization.
Thursday, November 10, 2016
Community Colleges since the Great Recession. Tuesday, December 6, 2016 930-1100AM
HBCUs,,,,I can't recall if many have setup a pipeline for graduates of even a neighboring community college to attend your campuses with direct admission.
Basic, simple AA degrees should get others in. Also has been an issue with transfer of credits from one institution to another. Interesting.
BEMA
Basic, simple AA degrees should get others in. Also has been an issue with transfer of credits from one institution to another. Interesting.
BEMA
Urban Institute Events
|
|
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)