Detroit Residents Appeal To UN After Bankrupt City Shuts Off Water Service

In a Nov. 14, 2013 photo, Carl King, left, watches as Kem Delaney prepares to shut off the water to an abandoned home in Detroit. As Detroit goes through the largest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history, the city’s... In a Nov. 14, 2013 photo, Carl King, left, watches as Kem Delaney prepares to shut off the water to an abandoned home in Detroit. As Detroit goes through the largest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history, the city’s porous water system illustrates how some of its resources are still draining away even as it struggles to stabilize its finances and provide basic services. More than 30,000 buildings stand vacant in neighborhoods hollowed out by Detroit’s long population decline, vulnerable to metal scavengers who rip out pipes, leaving the water to flow. (AP Photo/Carlos Osorio) MORE LESS
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In a telling sign of Detroit’s decline, activist groups who say the bankrupt city’s most vulnerable residents are being gouged by unaffordable water bills are appealing to the United Nations for help.

Al Jazeera America reported Sunday that local advocacy organizations asked the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to intervene in the Detroit Water and Sewage Department’s shutoff of water service to delinquent customers.

“What we see is a violation of the human right to water,” said Meera Karunananthan, an international campaigner with Canada’s Blue Planet Project, as quoted by Al Jazeera. “The U.S. has international obligations in terms of people’s right to water, and this is a blatant violation of that right. We’re hoping the U.N. will put pressure on the federal government and the state of Michigan to do something about it.”

The DWSD said in March that it planned to shut off service for up to 3,000 delinquent customers per week, according to the Detroit Free Press. There were 323,900 accounts with DWSD at the time — and nearly 50 percent of those accounts were delinquent.

“We really don’t want to shut off anyone’s water, but it’s really our duty to go after those who don’t pay, because if they don’t pay then our other customers pay for them,” DWSD spokeswoman Curtrise Garner said, as quoted by Al Jazeera. “That’s not fair to our other customers.”

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