Episode 5: Monica Galloway

Monica Galloway, who has served as a Flint City Council member since 2013, describes how she became the first African American and woman representing Ward 7 to serve on city council. During our discussion, she talks about the origins of modern inequalities in poor black spaces and provides excellent insight into the conditions facing Flint just before the water crisis came to light.  Councilwoman Galloway also discusses the misleading decisions by the state that led to the Flint Water Crisis, shares her perspective on the current settlement offer, and reminds us that the battle for justice persists in Flint. 

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Tainted Tap Podcast

Host by Dr. Katrinell M. Davis

Interview with Councilwoman Monica Galloway

Episode 5

Air Date: May 11, 2021

“There's enough data to show that this happened. Everybody in the world knows that it happened, and yet you're saying to the people, “Yeah, we know it happened, and we know that your disparity is that you don't have good medical insurance.”  Many times, you don't have access to reliable transportation or whatever. Like you said, the roadblocks are there, but shame on the system that  thinks that in a court of law, this is justice. You can make this kind of stuff up. This is like what best-selling movies are made up.”

Monica Galloway

How did you come to do what you do? 

Monica Galloway: There were billboards on Dort highway- I call them the two twin towers. They're strip clubs, and the billboards just started just getting worse, and so I didn't know where to go or what you could do.  I just kept hearing it. I don't know if you ever have intuition; I just kept hearing “city council” in my head. And I'm like, “What is that?”, and so I went to the city council to ask about what can be done. Then I started hearing “Elections, elections.”  So, I was the block club secretary, and I said to my husband, “I think you should run for city council,” and he took a few days, and he said, “No.” I said, “I think the Lord wants you to run for city council.” And then he said, “You know, I'm sure the Lord is not saying that to me.” I said, “I don't know, maybe he wants me to run, right?” I remember saying to the Lord, “I don't want to run against Dale Weighill. I think he's doing a good job.” He used to come to our block clubs, and he says, “Hey, if you know anybody interested in the city council, I'm not running for reelection, have them come talk to me.” I look over, and my husband and I'm going, “Yeah, definitely.” And so, needless to say, I sat down with him, and he was very frank, and he said, “You will win the primary, but there's never been an African American in the seat, and there's never been a female. There is someone that has run, and she's very active, so you won't win.” And he said, “I don't mean any disrespect. I'm just telling you the history of the seat.” And I said, “I understand that.” And then he told me how much it costs to run, and I’m like, “Oh yeah, absolutely not.” I didn't know what they did if they got paid or whatever, but I was just really following the intuition within me. I remember getting so discouraged talking to some who were seen as community leaders. They were very emphatic that because I wasn’t born and raised in Flint, my family didn't have enough of a history that I wouldn't be received- and I almost gave up. 

I realized I had an accelerated course, and the very first thing ironically that I started to learn about was the KWA because, at that time, it was on the forefront, the city taking part in the KWA. That's how I really got started and started learning about that, and who knew that it would lead to all of what we were experiencing?

…Although we have a diverse community, I'm just speaking from the African American position. We come from an ancestral background of injustice and steel pulling ourselves up. We've been often from the very inception of the nation.,  we’ve been conditioned, if you will, to expect to be on the losing end of something and make the best out of it. As a people, I think that we have done very well with that. My frustration has come in that there is something in me that's saying enough is enough. We can't always- and I'm so tired of the cliches, “When you got lemons, make lemonade.” That's not true because, without sugar, it is still lemon with water, right? “You got to deal with the cards you've been dealt." Well, how about when somebody dealing the cards is cheating? I'm just over all of those cliches, and injustice is injustice, and inequality is inequality, and inequity is inequity. We have to begin to address that and not allow any longer our children to be forced into a position that they should never experience and then say, “but perform.” That's what I'm over. The generations and centuries of injustice, it almost seems to me- and I think with your passion- I think we're feeling the same way where we're saying, “No, it's time to address the underlying current that still leads to genocide, oppression, and just injustice.” I think we're just tired of it, and we won't be silent anymore. 

What were people in Flint dealing with in terms of infrastructure, investment, public safety prior to the water crisis?

Monica Galloway: When I first came to the city council, as you know, we were under an emergency manager. The water rates were already high, and the city was at the time roughly about $12 million in deficit. So, the proposal of the KWA was supposed to create the ability for Flint to have its own water source, but also it was supposed to be a revenue stream where they would, in fact, have the ability to sell raw water and things like that. One of the things that was alarming for me is I remember finding an article in which they had asked Governor Snyder at the time, “How would flip in fact become a stakeholder in the KWA," when they were financially positioned at a negative 12 million? I remember calling my investment person, and I said, “What is it called when they lay something in front of you and say, ‘this is the answer,' but there's really no data?” I remember he said it's called “speculative investment." What the KWA was: “We’re the answer to your high-water costs problems. We're the answer to Detroit not having the ability to continue to increase the rates on you. We’re the answer.” With that deal, the city of Flint would take on about a third of that debt, which was about $100 plus million dollars that a debt would be on the residents of the city of Flint. Now what's interesting about that is based on our financial position, we could not secure a bond, so the county would have to take out a bond, and Flint would be responsible for it because we just didn't have equity, the capital, we didn't have the rating. How do we take on this debt? All of a sudden, that was supposed to happen in a certain timeframe that it didn't happen in, so someone thought, “Well, another way that we could save money while the KWA is being built is we'll cancel our contract with Detroit, and we'll go to the Flint River.” Now before, the Flint River was not an option until after the deal was signed for the KWA. It's important that people really do their research. 

Katrinell Davis:  Councilwoman Galloway's assessment is quite accurate, as we'll hear in this next clip from a March 2013 meeting. Genesee County drain commissioner, Jeff Wright, confirmed that just before the contract was signed, the Flint River was only considered a potential blending source.

City Council Meeting Audio

Councilperson 1: Okay, so say, for instance, that we reach our capacity if we moved to KWA, and we couldn't buy any more water from KWA because of the capacity issue. Wouldn’t our backup system automatically kick in? 

Councilperson 2: You absolutely could utilize the Flint River for blending. You're just going to have to spend a few more dollars. Let's face it: we're talking multiple years down the road before you would get to that point, theoretically. So you would have to spend a few more dollars on your treatment plant to be able to blend either source of water. 

Councilperson 1: Now, when I read the DEQ report, and I was one of the ones that asked about a DEQ report related to the Flint River -and I did appreciate it when Howard Croft finally brought it to us on that following week after I asked four times- but in the report, it also talks about the Flint treatment facility. He said that if we did decide to go with the blending issue, it would be beneficial to the city of Flint because it will make the treatment plan full-time operational, and all of this stuff would work properly. I guess right now, we're only operating how many times. Help me out, Mr. Neely?

Councilperson 3: Twice a year, I think. Twenty-four hours twice a year. 

Monica Galloway: So once that was done, they decided to go to the Flint River, a switch. By the time October came, General Motors was before the city council, saying, “Hey, this water is negatively affecting our engines.” I remember being at that meeting and saying, “Wait a minute, if it's doing that to engines, what is it doing to the body of the residents?” So we made a motion to switch back to Detroit, and the emergency manager at that time was Gerald Ambrose, and he emphatically said, “No, we're not paying $12.9 million to go back to Detroit.”  I remember saying to him on record, “You know what, if it were for my life, $12 million is not a lot from one person, but can you imagine 12.9 million roughly for a hundred thousand people?” If you divide that, to me, that was like a no-brainer. As I did further research, I learned that during that space, from April to October, the GLWA- Great Lakes Water Authority- was being established. In my opinion, I don't think people realize- I read a statement when they did the vote to go back to GLWA- I said. Unfortunately, I believe that Flint was strategically taken off because we were probably their largest customer, and with that loss of income, they were able to show vulnerability.” I said, “I believe that Detroit unknowingly was the victim of a hostile takeover,” because you had a black city that controlled the water source. If you look at the organizational chart of the GLWA, you will see that during that process, in which they refused to let us go back to Detroit, GLWA was being established. It wasn't until all of the things started happening, I think the following year, they were already established by then. GLWA had broken out a deal with Detroit, and then the residents of the city of Flint were told that the only way we could go- first of all, they said, “If you don't go back to Detroit, you're going to go bankrupt, because the bond debt that you took on to go to GLWA is going to bankrupt you.” Now, how is it that a debt that we should have never taken part of, that was decided not by us, but those that were called to come in and help us, how is it that now you leverage that bond that over us and say, “You know, by the way, if you don't, you're going to go bankrupt?” Interestingly enough, when you talk about infrastructure, here we were with a new pipeline, no infrastructural issues at all. You're talking about 50 to 70 years of life. So now the investment that we made is being used against us. Then, “Oh, and by the way, you thought you were getting away from Detroit, but now we're going to put you into a 30-year deal with them, and we're going to take that pipeline that you guys invested in. We're just going to take that.” I think that that's important for people to understand because now you've forced us- and as much as we say 30 years, that's a forever deal. I believe that, in my opinion, the bond debt was secured fraudulently. I don't understand why there isn't a serious investigation into the ability to take part in a thing that would eventually lead to threatening. Even the court system, the proceeding, was oppressive. If I could say anything, it was a bully tactic; it was a force shield. What I don't understand is who the people are that are so important that everybody is saying, “Let's just brush over this and ignore it.” 

…Unfortunately, again- and I'll just have to say this- I'm not saying that lead isn't a problem, but it's not the problem; but it's easy to use that because now you've got community saying, “Oh, we got lead; oh, we got lead.” No, it's not the same thing. First of all, we were poisoned. We're not talking about all those other things. We know we've been dealing with lead for years, but this wasn't that; this was negligent. And if you ever get the court recording and documents, you will read in the transcripts some of the things that were said, and we know someone from the MDQ or the EPA said, “Flint is not worth going out on the limb for.” There were decisions made, but even deeper in that you will read the transcripts that show that one of the strategic things that they did in an effort that if the KWA ever came under question- there was a transcript, and I can't think of the name. I had the documents where the person said, “We need to allow this to go to a vote so that we can show that all ten elected officials said yes. It literally said in the transcript, “Just in case this came under question, we would be able to say your elected officials did this, and so, therefore, their agreement legitimized what we did.”

Monica Galloway: I don't know why. All of these things are documented. Yet here we are, the residents of this community: it's like, we're dispensable; it's like, “You're your kids don't matter, and we're not going to fight for you, and yes, you are a citizen...” Even when people magazine did the cover story, The Poisoning of an American City, we would be appalled, but how long did that last? You know why, because they're dispensable, their babies don't matter, but our babies do matter. Eventually, someone is going to pay, and this water settlement is a disgrace. The thing that's the biggest disgrace to me is that the attorneys can walk away with so much money. The deadline just passed, unfortunately.  Do you know how many residents I ran into that didn't even get a packet? Here, these attorneys could possibly get 37% or so, and you didn't do more in a community that you know doesn't have access to, maybe the things that they need to.

 It just seems like there are so many roadblocks that have been put up.

Monica Galloway: What's interesting is that I was telling somebody, “Can you imagine?”- and I love movies. One of the things I thought about is the one with Damon Wayans, “Major Payne." When his kids gave him a muffin or a cupcake with something in it that will cause his insides to go crazy, but because of his body, it processed it differently. So, it didn't negatively impact him like it should have, or may have even done to someone else. The point is this: we know emphatically that the residents of the city of Flint were poisoned. Can you imagine someone poisoning your coffee, and it's learned that they poisoned your coffee, but you didn't die? They will be prosecuted with attempted murder. The fact that it didn't kill you, or you didn't have any adverse effect on it, doesn't stop the fact that you attempted to poison somebody. 

…You understand what I'm saying? For the victims to be responsible for the burden of proof, that's another level of oppression, another level of illegal behavior. I looked it up in the black law dictionary. I'm not a lawyer, but I love the law, and I was just meditating on it one day, and I started looking up poison, and it talked about it being deemed as attempted murder. Here you are, you have a community that struggles with a poverty level of about the 30%- 40%. You know for a fact that there's enough data to show that this happened, this really happened, everybody in the world knows that it happened, and yet you're saying to the people, “Yeah, we know it happened, and we know that your disparity is that you don't have good medical insurance many times. You don't have access to reliable transportation or whatever.” The roadblocks are there, but shame on the system that thinks that in a court of law, this is justice. You can’t make this kind of stuff up. This is like what best-selling movies are made of. 

…You are a researcher. Just think about people that don't know how to research, that don't know how far you have to dig because it's buried. You know, you’re a researcher. Just think about people. Finally, after you've been oppressed for so long, somebody tells you that they're going to give you a thousand-dollar check, and you're like, “Where do I go?” When this is longstanding, if I were in a court of law, and this happened to my baby, I would have a malpractice lawsuit. They would assess the needs of my child. Who knows how many child children you're talking about? Normally when they assess, they assess value. They assess what your child could have been or would have been. I realized, and I got so angry, I just said, “Lord, they can't assess the value of our children. They didn't create them. They have no idea what is within them.” My thing is, I won't allow you to place value on my child, and I believe that one day- those people, whoever they are- justice will be served. When it is served, it's going to be swift, and it's going to be visual, and everybody is going to see it. You will not be able to abuse the children who did nothing. Their government made decisions that adversely affected them. If you think that you can make a decision like that, and you just skate with your retirement fund, I curse your retirement fund. I curse every investment that you've made on the back of our babies because one day you're going to give an account, and it won't be long, but we have to consistently fight- until it's your baby or one of your grandbabies, you got to say, “I'm sorry, we're not dispensable. You can’t just say, “Yeah, the value of their life is not that important.”, and so it just makes me very passionate. I have to keep my emotions and anger and check, though, and I want to just say this: the other thing that's really disappointing is there is more wealth in the hands of blacks than there's ever been in our history. Yet, we shouldn't be asking other people. We need to do more ourselves; we should be able to help. We do a lot in the Third World countries. There are things that we could do that would send such a message. You talk about our ancestors that didn't ride the bus for 13 months. Do you know how devastating that was to their finances? They were committed, and it made enough of a point to change things. Now we have access to more resources and wealth than we've ever had. 

What's your take on what we need to help Flint get back to where it needs to be? Where are we going to get to the place where Flint's kids will have the resources they need to learn?

Monica Galloway: …That's a tough question. One of the things that Flint is fortunate in is that, with the new packet that was approved, we're slated to get about $99 million. Some of the things that the money can be used on our infrastructure. The question becomes- and it’s interesting- as long as I've been on council, we've been told that either through theft or leakage, we lose roughly about 40% of our water, even before we start to charge the residents. That's always been an issue. Well, in a recent community meeting, one of the speakers by the city of Flint said that that's down to 9%. Now that would be a miracle, and so I can't wait to find out if how true that can be and what we're using as far as data. In fact, that is the case; you talked about water costs. The residents of the city of Flint paid large water bills. If, in fact, the leakage has decreased to such as you say, how do we pass that on to the residents while still maintaining the water and sewer funds, because that's an enterprise fund, for many people that don't understand that that means that fund is designed to make money, it has to sustain itself. With that being said, there has to be some sort of relief for the residents because many residents, depending on their income, are spending too much on a water bill. Even under the United Nations, there's only so much of a percentage that people are supposed to be paying on water. I don't know why that's not equating to us. There's a lot that I'm not understanding because if people are spending 20%-30% of their monthly income on a water bill, it seems like we're in violation. How can that be? I know I said a lot, but we have to figure out how to be able to perform the things that are necessary to ensure that our water is properly treated. But as anyone knows, when you've experienced trauma, the mind doesn't trust that what you're saying is true, even if the water might be good, the mind says, “Ah, you fooled me once, I can't let you.” Those that are telling us the water is good have been the very ones that manipulated and defrauded us. Your word is not good, and because this is so large on a federal and state level, we don't trust the third parties that you bring in because we don't know what their motive is, because we can't believe that their motive is for us. There's this pessimistic thing within us that we didn't feed, someone ignited in us. With that being said, it's going to take a very strategic plan and execution along with the resources to make this right. Um, but it's going to take years because you’re talking about five years- six years now- of injustice, and someone decides that they're just going to sweep it under the rug. “It's just Flint. They don't matter. We'll give them some crumbs,” because I'm sorry, that is crumbs. Most people aren't even going to get it because they can't provide the required documentation. Let's just say you want to sign up online for the Flint water settlement. You had to have the ability to download your ID and upload it. Come on now. You're talking about- no offense to our community- but we struggle with illiteracy. You continue when in fact, you'll have all the data to see that this is a valid resident. You have the ability to go to active water bills, I’m telling you. 

…Don't forget the star power. Don't forget the stargazers. We had the celebrities that came into our community, and they came and made everybody think, “The lawyers are the answer.” And where are they now?