From Florida to Washington state, from Maine to California and everywhere in between, towns, cities and county governments are caving in to the privatization schemes of global corporations, with their elected officials — Democrats and Republicans alike — paving the way. These corporations have our public officials doing their bidding. They are selling their corporate wares and false promises of privatization.
In a recent survey, 200 mayors of large and small cities said they would consider water privatization if they could see budget savings. And the federal government is applying privatization pressure from the top by denying federal money, even loan money, to government agencies at the local level to improve their water systems. The effects of the federal government's actions are being felt all the way down to the U.S. Conference of Mayors, through its Urban Water Council, which has become a feeding frenzy for global corporations looking to make sure that nothing is left in the public's hands, including clean and safe, affordable water.
The results are alarming. People in communities all across the United States are being priced out of our most basic, life-or-death resource, such as in the Detroit, Michigan area, where 45,000 households have had their water shut-off by the water company that is privately managed. Or in places like Felton, California, where residents saw their rates go though the roof, illustrated by the story of a woman there who runs a facility that services the poor in the community, who saw her water bill increase from $250 to $1250 a month.
Reaction against and resistance to water privatization is cropping up in communities across the country. These struggles are important and must grow. However, they are scattered, unconnected and isolated from each other because they remain locally focused and mostly defensive. We need to connect up across the nation and go on the offensive, to safeguard our commonly owned public water by running these corporate water thieves and their political cronies out of every meeting, in every city and town across the land.
Water is the most basic and vital natural resource needed by humankind. Its common ownership is vital to human life itself. We need to build a powerful political movement to nationalize all of our natural and public resources and join with others around the globe, who are engaged in the same life and death struggles. This is a step towards ultimately creating a new, commonly owned and cooperative society, where the overwhelming abundance that is being produced is shared by all.
