On August 2, 2014, the residents of Toledo, Ohio, a port city on the shores of Lake Erie, woke up without clean water. Testing had detected elevated levels of microcystin — a potent liver toxin and possible human carcinogen — in the city's drinking water supply, and for three days, residents were told not to drink, bathe in, or even touch their tap water. The toxins were traced to a harmful algal bloom, or HAB, a potent green sludge made up of microscopic algae and bacteria that had sprouted in the shallow waters of the lake.
Alicia Smith remembers that day. Nearly half a million people lost access to drinking water, and 110 got sick, experiencing headaches, chest tightness, muscle weakness, and nausea. Smith is the director of the Junction Coalition, a community organization in Toledo that works on promoting environmental justice and economic empowerment for the city's low-income residents, many of them communities of color. Every August since then, she said, her neighbors worry about whether they'll lose access to water again as fresh blooms occur.
