Racial Slur Hurled In Flint Water Recording, Official Resigns
By Sara Jerome,
@sarmje
An official in Genesee County resigned this week after using a racial slur to describe water customers in Flint, MI.
A tape surfaced of Genesee County Land Bank official Phil Stair using the “n-word.” The audio recording prompted demonstrations calling for Stair to resign, according to Michigan Radio.
The Associated Press reported “that Stair can be heard in the recording blaming problems in the city of Flint on people who ‘don't pay their bills.’ Stair is white.”
Chelsea Lyons, an environmental activist and independent journalist, made the recording, according to Michigan Live.
“Lyons said she's concerned by the Land Bank's role as Flint's largest property owner. The agency takes over tax-foreclosed properties, carrying out demolitions, rehabilitations and sales,” the report said.
According to a copy obtained by MLive, Stair made the following statement in a resignation letter: “I feel that I cannot carry out nor be effective in my position at the Land Bank with the social media [recording] of my private opinion on the Flint water crisis and the insensitive language used. I am deeply sorry for what I said and those I offended. I do not know how I can face my friends and co-workers.”
Under a recent city policy, failure to pay water bills could now lead to home foreclosures.
“Thousands of Flint, MI, residents have been warned that they could lose their homes if they don’t pay outstanding water bills — even as the city has just begun replacing lead-tainted pipes after a contamination crisis linked to a dozen deaths,” The Washington Post recently reported.
Over 8,000 residents were sent warning letters in April as the city tries to collect $5.8 million in unpaid water and sewer bills. In February, Michigan withdrew the water-bill assistance it had provided Flint residents after the lead contamination crisis came to light three years ago, the Detroit Free Press reported.
Hundreds of children in Flint, MI, suffered elevated blood-lead levels during the lead-contamination crisis that struck city drinking water.
Image credit: "20161004-FNS-LSC-0039," U.S. Department of Agriculture, 2016. Public Domain: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/