Lowndes County is in rural Alabama, sandwiched between its more famous neighbors Selma and Montgomery.
Lowndes County has come to national attention as of late due to its predominantly black and poor residents suffering from sewage issues, Governing.com reports. Health risks such as human waste stagnating in open pits and raw sewage flooding open areas after heavy rains are everyday experiences for Lowndes residents.
Investigating the effects of the waste, Baylor University researchers found evidence of hookworm, a parasitic tropical disease thought to have been eradicated in the U.S., in more than a third of Lowndes County residents.
After the findings were released, the United Nation's Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, Philip Alston, explored the county last December to investigate further.
“I think it’s very uncommon in the First World. This is not a sight that one normally sees. I’d have to say that I haven’t seen this,” Alston said.
How did things become so dire?
First off, most Lowndes County residents live too far away from sewer systems; this means their homes aren't linked into the sewage grid that services cities. Instead, their waste goes to expensive septic tanks buried underground.
The septic tanks are supposed to process waste locally and rely on natural elements found in certain types of soil to help filter the debris, making its release into local land safe. Sadly, Lowndes County has a lot of chalk and clay under its topsoil; neither of these can adequately absorb and filter the waste. Instead, debris released by the septic tanks is pushed up to the surface, where it pools dangerously.
Further complicating the issue is the fact it is illegal for residents to lack proper sewage systems. State law deems it a misdemeanor “to build, maintain or use an insanitary [sic] sewage collection, treatment and disposal facility.”
In 2002, the Alabama government threatened to arrest more than 37 residents for their improper sewage systems. None of those 37 homes could afford to fix the systems.
As the number of homes with illegal sewage systems increased, judges began to have a hard time enforcing the law.
The local government finally partnered with residents to install new septic systems, but they all failed because, again, the ground in Lowndes County can't handle standard buried septic systems.
Sadly, Alabama isn't the only state currently dealing with these issues.
“It’s not just in Alabama. A lot of rural communities are experiencing the same problem,” noted Catherine Flowers, founder of Alabama Center for Rural Enterprise. “This is a problem around the country that shouldn’t exist.”
Flowers said she has talked with fellow advocates in over a dozen states struggling with the same issue as the residents of Lowndes, including Alaska, California, Kentucky and Virginia.
Experts now believe even more states could be at risk, which could make this a more substantial federal issue.
With that in mind, Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ) got together with Alabama's Senator Doug Jones (D) and West Virginia's Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R) to try to help low- and middle-income homeowners secure a federal grant that would assist them in installing and maintaining septic systems.
The three senators added the plan to the Senate's controversial 2018 farm bill; however, the project is not present in the House's version of the law.
“People are literally being poisoned,” Booker told reporters during the National Baptist Conference USA meeting in Mobile, Alabama, back in January, according to AL.com. “These are our children and elderly folks living in a toxic environment.”
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