The Disappearing Sea and The Commons
Ship cemetery at Moynak.
Sometimes at Food & Water Watch, communicating our international work and connecting it to our domestic activism can be a challenge, but it shouldn’t be. We require water for life, yet there are water stressed communities in the U.S. and around the world. And several factors are coalescing to make water the oil of the 21st century: population growth, climate change, pollution, misuse of water resources and a current industry effort to push water management into the private sphere, after centuries of management as a common resource.
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Will Coke and Nestlé Use More Tap Water?
Coca-Cola is closing a spring water bottling plant in High Springs, FL, a move they say is because they want to concentrate on bottling purified water. But their “purified” bottled water actually comes from municipal sources. Coke switching from spring water to purified water essentially means a switch from spring water to tap water. This is certainly a unique occasion when Coca-Cola admits that they are selling tap water in those bottles. But what does it mean for taxpayers when a beverage company wants to focus more on municipal water?
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Can Water Privatization Drain a Community?
We talk all the time about how expensive bottled water can be. Imagine paying $175 each week for your family’s supply of water in your own home. Unfortunately, some residents in Northwood Oaks, a community in Raleigh, North Carolina, are finding out the hard way that bad things can happen when public services like water are privatized.
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Citrus County, FL Rejects Privatization
Citizens like the residents of Citrus County, Florida, have the power to fight privatization of public water. It starts with a well informed public.
Residents of Citrus County, Florida did it right: They questioned a process BEFORE it was put in place. In this case, the process was moving the county’s public utilities toward privatization. Thanks to the Citrus County Council — a grass-roots consortium of civic clubs, homeowners associations and environmental groups — residents were well informed about what privatization would mean for Citrus County, and they told their commissioners to reject privatizing their water utility.
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Give the People What They Want: A Vote
A couple of weeks ago, a Trenton citizens group had a most resounding victory in the New Jersey Supreme Court. After a year of legal tussling, the highest court in New Jersey validated citizens’ right to choose whether or not to sell their public water utility to a private company. You might be thinking, “Isn’t that a basic American right – to have a voice when it comes to a public resource?” You’d be right to think that, but it doesn’t always work out that way.
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