Flint residents paid the highest water rates in the U.S. at a time when they were unknowingly drinking tap water that was contaminated with high lead levels, according to a study released on Tuesday.
The nonprofit group Food and Water Watch found that households in Flint paid an $864 annual water bill, more than 10 times the amount charged by the nation’s least-expensive water systems.
Those numbers are based on research by Food and Water Watch of the 500 largest water systems in the country. They found that a typical household using 60,000 gallons of water a
year paid $316 for water service.
The Flint water rates in the study, effective January 2015, were reduced by 35 percent last August by a judge who ruled that the expenses charged by the cash-strapped city were unreasonable.
The study found that water rates vary wildly across southeast Michigan.
For example, in Sterling Heights, which leap-frogged Flint in recent years and became the state’s fourth largest city, the average annual water bill is just $165, according to the report. That puts Sterling Heights’ national rank at No. 472.
The study also shows how counterintuitive water rates can be. Flint, located about 30 miles from the largest freshwater body in the world, the Great Lakes, paid the highest rates in the nation. Phoenix, surrounded by the Arizona desert, paid the lowest rates ($86 a year) in the nation.
