What’s behind Jackson, Mississippi’s continuing water crisis?
Chokwe Antar Lumumba, the mayor of the US city, says the crisis is a consequence of ‘issues of environmental racism’.
Following floods that overwhelmed Mississippi state capital’s water treatment facility in August, the city’s approximately 160,000 residents have regularly lacked access to safe drinking water and, in some cases, running water at all.
Months after the flooding, water pressure has been partially restored and some federal and state resources have been allocated to repair the water system. However, Jackson Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba says the state of Mississippi is not doing enough to help his city and its residents, more than 80 percent of whom are Black.
“It’s issues of environmental racism. It’s a community that is not fully valued, and therefore the state does not see any responsibility or need to fund the residents of Jackson, fund these challenges,” Lumumba says.
On UpFront, Mayor Lumumba joins Marc Lamont Hill to discuss some of the systemic issues at the heart of Jackson’s public health crisis.