The Benton Harbor water crisis persists for our employees and students. The community is still being directed by the State of Michigan to use only bottled water for drinking, cooking, brushing teeth, rinsing foods, and mixing powdered infant formula.
“The students say they are using about a case of water a day,” says Educational Coordinator Megan Landry. “The students who are mothers are really having to watch their children closely so they don’t drink the tap water.”
As you can imagine, this restriction turns simple tasks like getting your children ready for bed, or prepping food for dinner, into a process well beyond the norm. “It effects almost everything in my life”, says Medical Assistant student Shalynda Seuell.
Seuell adds, “The only thing that stayed normal is bathing or showering. Everything else, we have to boil the water or use bottled water.”
Ross will be sending another pallet of water to the campus for distribution to staff and students, and will continue to seek ways to support our Ross family in Benton Harbor and other communities which we call home.
For more information, or to help support Benton Harbor, visit the Southwest Michigan Community Action Agency’s website at smcaa.com/bentonharborwater.