colonias

A south wind begins to blow
By Martin Heldt

June 13, 2000 | Just imagine the outcry that there would be were it to
be found out that between 150,000-200,000 Minnesotans had no adequate
water supply.

Now, imagine the shouting if it were revealed that 300,000 of the
"fightin Illini" had no wastewater systems or services and that even
outhouses were in short supply.

Then, imagine the shock to learn that the median family income in rural
Pennsylvania villages is estimated to hover around $7,000-$11,000.

The conditions that I have described would not be tolerated here. In
fact, they are unimaginable conditions that would have us marching in
the streets. They are routine, though, in the Texas colonias.

So why is an Iowa farm boy talking about Texas? It is because of one
partially clogged toilet in Tennessee. Well, more accurately, its because the
Republicans thought it would be funny to label Gore a "slum lord" because a
rental property of his has problems with one of its two toilets.

It was really a minor problem that was handled badly by Gore's property
manager (who Al had the sense to fire.)

This property manager kept putting off doing anything about the sluggish
toilet until the renter went to the local TV station. After that the
Republican National Committee just plain went nuts. Blast faxes,
interviews, outraged talk show callers screaming about the "empire of
the slum lord" Gore---it was dirty and it wasn't mud they were throwing.

Oh, yes. The Republicans thought they would be oh-so-cute dragging up
one bad toilet in a two-toilet house. But they were so busy raining a
gleeful stink down upon Al Gore that they forgot about the tens of
thousands of Texans who don't even have a toilet. People are digging
holes behind their shacks and crapping like cats in these colonias.
People are filling up buckets with human wastes and then dumping them
into nearby ditches. Something stinks in Texas but, as always, G. W. has
positioned himself upwind so as not to be offended.

The lack of septic systems in the colonias is far more than an
inconvenience, it is a serious and deadly health threat. People are
catching hepatitis at third world rates. Babies are succumbing to
diseases like dysentery and diarrhea as if this was an undeveloped
nation in Africa and not the United States.

To be fair this isn't all Bush's doing. But the number of colonias
residents has nearly doubled during his governorship. He hasn't said
much about the problem either, other than this quote from the Austin
American Statesman last year; "I would say the progress is good -- not
great, not excellent, but good -- certainly not poor".

There were TV crews on hand in Tennessee to film a smiling Mrs. Mayberry
as the plumbers carted off that stopped up fixture.

Isn't it time that a TV crew goes out and films some smiling kids as
they play along a ditch in the colonias as human waste bobs by?