Getting the Lead Out in Milwaukee

Permanent cognitive damage, behavioral problems, higher school suspension rates, health issues, and increased incarceration for violent crimes. This combination of issues is affecting communities across the country. The culprit? Lead exposure.

Lead contamination impacts communities in rural and urban areas, alike, across the Great Lakes region. In Wisconsin, alone, lead-poisoned children are found in each of the state’s 72 counties.

Toxic lead poisoning can result from a variety of causes, from lead dust in paint and soil to lead pipes that supply drinking water into people’s homes. As of December 31, 2021, Milwaukee had approximately 67,000 active water service lines made of lead.

The majority of Wisconsin’s lead poisoning cases are from Milwaukee’s north and south sides, where the local populations are predominantly Black and Brown. From this crisis, Milwaukee has also become home to a grassroots collective working to get the lead out of the city: The Coalition on Lead Emergency (COLE). COLE is a collective of nonprofits, environmentalists, educators, doctors, community members, and civic activists aiming to create a sustainable lead safe environment in Milwaukee by engaging a broad range of community partners.

To learn more about COLE and the lead situation in Milwaukee, we spoke to the chair of the collective, Richard Diaz.

Filling a Need

COLE first came about in response to a state of lead emergency in certain neighborhoods of Milwaukee, primarily those with Black and Brown residents. Through a small grant from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), workers from the Dominican Center, a local neighborhood advocacy, education, and advocacy organization, began canvassing local neighborhoods and found that there was a continued fear around lead poisoning. Seeing an ongoing need for education and advocacy around lead, COLE formed as an organization.

The grassroots coalition now serves as a connector among groups, building community with those who have been affected by the crisis. Their work is based around four imperatives: education, workforce development, advocacy, and COLE parents lead. Despite having no funding and being primarily volunteer-based, COLE is encouraging big changes in the city. But there are many hurdles to overcome to make Milwaukee lead-free.

Show Me the Money (and the Workforce)

The City of Milwaukee has replaced less than 1,000 of its full lead service lines annually since launching its effort in 2017. Replacing the remaining 70,000 lead pipes at that pace would take more than 70 years, and the full price tag would cost hundreds of millions of dollars that city officials say they lack. Some headway will hopefully be made with the Infrastructure, Investment, and Jobs Act, which is expected to send $50 million per year to Wisconsin between 2023 and 2027.

But to accelerate progress, it will take even more investment, as well as a sufficient number of local workers to do the job. As Diaz explained, “We don’t have the money. We can’t pay for our own lead service lines to be replaced without the state giving the city of Milwaukee more principal forgiveness for families living in poverty, or for the city or another funding source to eliminate cost share so that rate payers won’t see an increase in the water bill." 

Workforce development is also a huge concern for Diaz and COLE. Training local residents to do this work would allow them to have greater career mobility and move into other jobs within the water sector. Growing the local water utility workforce would also be a huge economic boon to the community.

Expanding the workforce also includes hiring more people at the water utility to boost community engagement, so that local water issues and concerns can be raised, and local solutions can be prioritized. Often times, understaffing at water utilities can lead to limited community interaction. According to Diaz, when community engagement is done by the water utility, it’s often detached from what resonates with community members. For example, mail tends to be limited in its effectiveness and many people might not be able to understand the material. However, community engagement is improving as groups like COLE work with Milwaukee Water Works (the local water utility) to provide suggestions on bettering their processes.

Improving Intended Use Plans

Every year, the federal government provides millions of dollars to local communities throughout the United States to update, repair, and fix their drinking water and wastewater infrastructure through the Drinking Water and Clean Water State Revolving Funds. The Drinking Water State Revolving Funds rules require that each state develop an Intended Use Plan to map out how the funding will be disbursed and used over the course of the year. With insight from COLE for the Fiscal Year 2022 plan, the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) has added a commitment to workforce development, water affordability, and sustainability as goals in the Intended Use Plan. Additionally, the DNR has adjusted criteria for the definition of disadvantaged communities and added criteria for principal forgiveness. These updates will help get funding to communities hit hardest by pollution, as well as make projects more affordable by essentially changing loans to grants. Previously, the two main criteria for principal forgiveness were median household income and population size. That criteria has now expanded to include prevalence and severity of poverty, as well as unemployment rates and population decline. This is a huge change for Milwaukee. Under the previous criteria, Milwaukee did not quality for principal forgiveness, but now they might be able to, which would help to expedite lead service line replacement.

Despite this potential, the DNR also has a cap for water utilities that qualify for principal forgiveness. The cap was previously $500,000 but has since expanded to $1.5 million thanks to COLE’s advocacy. Unfortunately for Milwaukee, $1.5 million still wouldn’t be enough for full lead service line replacement, considering each line costs around $11,000 to replace and there are approximately 67,000 active water service lines still made of lead.

Federal Action

Lead poisoning is further complicated in that it is a cross sector issue. For Diaz, this means that federal organizations like the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Housing and Urban Development need to come together and provide support to communities that have been affected by lead, especially those who have seen the worst of its impacts. That’s why any federal work needs to be done in tandem with community groups like COLE that have already been doing the work on the ground.

An estimated $50 million a year will be going to Wisconsin through the Infrastructure, Investment, and Jobs Act between 2023 and 2027. This is expected to accelerate ongoing efforts to replace lead service lines. However, considering that Milwaukee, alone, requires around $750 million for replacement, more money is needed to get this work done. For the federal government, this means that annual federal appropriations need to be fully funded at authorized levels. Unfortunately, it looks as if federal appropriations this year will be lower than the fully authorized levels for the State Revolving Funds. The draft budget bill for fiscal year 2023 contains $2.88 billion for the Drinking Water and Clean Water State Revolving Funds, whereas the programs were both authorized at $2.75 billion each, for a $5.5 billion total authorization. Without federal investment to speed up the process, lead poisoning will continue to affect communities in Milwaukee and across the Great Lakes region, as a whole.

To learn more about COLE or to get in contact with them, check out these links.

Website: CoalitionOnLeadEmergency.org

Email: CoalitionOnLeadEmergency@gmail.com

Facebook: Coalition on Lead Emergency

YouTube: COLE Info