Have you ever had to go without water in your home for a few days?
It’s excruciating, and its absence makes a person realize how much we take for granted the essentials of life: fresh air, heat, cooling equipment, clean water and electricity, for example.
The people of Santa Cruz, as we revealed in last week’s Rio Grande SUN, are forced to drink tap water that is contaminated with levels of uranium well above the legal limit. The people of Santa Cruz had been drinking uranium-contaminated water for more than 60 years before the state informed them of the problem in 2002. The most recent sampling, from July 2022, revealed a uranium level of 36 micrograms per liter in residents’ drinking water — a level experts say poses a serious health risk.
Uranium is a carcinogen that, in addition to causing cancer, can damage kidneys and cause other health problems linked to radiation exposure.
The radioactive contamination of Santa Cruz’s water reflects a systemic failure of government on the local, state and federal levels.
Intervention by state government leaders and agencies is needed to resolve this crisis. The SUN calls on all of its legislative representatives from Rio Arriba County to take action, and help the people of Santa Cruz secure clean water for their families.
In the 21 years since state government put Santa Cruz on notice about the contamination, little has been done to protect residents’ health. No elected leader or government agency has seen fit to place the safety of this proud, independent-minded community atop their agenda. No one in the governor’s mansion or Roundhouse has done all that is necessary to ensure clean drinking water for its inhabitants.
This is a travesty.
A $1.6 million appropriation from the state nearly a decade ago wasn’t enough to complete an upgrade to the Santa Cruz water system, a plan that called for installation of four uranium treatment systems.
Two of those systems are yet to be installed due to easement issues, which the Santa Cruz Water Association says it lacks the money to address.
Accountability starts with the association, whose board members must find a way to install additional uranium treatment systems and protect their customers. Their jobs are thankless, and not easy to fill. But after the excuses comes the reality: the association is selling customers drinking water with harmful concentrations of uranium, while state regulators issue one toothless violation after another.
Facing a patchwork of public water authorities across New Mexico, those regulators say they are struggling to enforce water contaminant laws in rural communities like Santa Cruz. That explains why the Santa Cruz Water Association has been allowed to continue selling unsafe water decade after decade, despite hundreds of violation notices and multiple compliance orders from the state.
In this week’s SUN, columnist Sherry Robinson addresses the problems small communities face with their water systems, many of which are old and outdated and unsafe.
A 2021 report by the Environment Department’s Drinking Water Bureau said the agency had “made significant progress with compliance determinations over the past several years, [but] overall the program is struggling to ensure that core functions are being met.”
“The lack of adequate funding to maintain minimal staffing levels and our ability to ensure that the program is able to function at a basic level continue to be significant challenges,” the report states.
The Drinking Water Bureau must be given the state funding necessary to ensure safe drinking water for rural communities such as Santa Cruz. When the state Health Department is underfunded, people are left unprotected against public health threats like unsafe drinking water.
The SUN calls on the Legislature to fund the completion of the Santa Cruz Water Association’s uranium treatment project. Elected leaders representing Santa Cruz and El Llano must not rest until their constituents have water that is safe to drink. It’s the very least they deserve from their political leaders.
Clean, potable water is actually a “right,” not a gift, and our elected officials must protect our people and make certain we all have access to clean water.