Editor’s note: This article was initially published in the Detroit Free Press.
BY LORI HIGGINS
Detroit Free Press
It started with a phone call to the United Way of Southeastern Michigan. And within about a week, Detroit Superintendent Nikolai Vitti and his staff had secured nearly all of the money needed for a permanent fix for the water crisis that has enveloped the Detroit school district for nearly two months.
Vitti announced Tuesday that the Detroit Public Schools Community District had secured $2.4 million in donations from businesses and organizations. It’s putting the district well on its way to covering the $3-million cost of purchasing and installing water hydration stations in every school in the district.
It could be the model for the future as the district seeks funding or support from the business community for other initiatives, Vitti said.
The news came on the same day the Detroit Board of Education unanimously approved the work associated with installing the hydration stations, which Vitti said will provide a safer option for students to drink water because the stations come with a built-in filter that purifies the water of any lead or copper.
Among the work the board approved: a nearly $742,000 contract with Advance Plumbing and Heating Supply — which has offices in Detroit and Walled Lake — to provide 818 Elkay hydration systems and a $1.2-million contract with GDI Integrated Facility Management for the installation of the equipment. GDI is a Canadian business, but Vitti said most of its employees are in metro Detroit. The Detroit Financial Review Commission, which has some financial oversight of the district, will need to approve the contracts the board OK’d. The commission meets Thursday.
But the big news of the day was the philanthropic donations. Twelve businesses and organizations, and one anonymous individual, have pledged to help cover the costs. They include Quicken Loans, the United Way of Southeastern Michigan, Delta Dental Foundation and DTE Foundation.
It all began, Vitti said during a news conference Tuesday afternoon, with a call to Darienne Driver, the CEO of the United Way of Southeastern Michigan.
“The United Way was the first to step forward. After that, many others came on board to offer a solution.”
Driver said that when Vitti called “and said what was happening in the district, it wasn’t a matter of can we help … it was really when and how soon can we get started.”
“My prayer is that we never have to have this day again,” Driver said.
Laura Grannemann, vice president of strategic investments for Quicken Loans Community Fund, expressed a similar sentiment.
“No student can be successful in education and employment without access to clean drinking water,” Grannemann said. “We believe we need to be a part of this solution.”
Vitti said it took about a week to secure all the donations. There were a lot of phone calls. And there were meetings. The Detroit Public Schools Foundation — the independent group that raises money for district initiatives — also assisted, he said.
“People picked up the phone and they were receptive,” Vitti said.
Board member Angelique Peterson-Mayberry said she appreciated the work the administration has done.
“It’s about time that something is done because I do have a child in the district,” Peterson-Mayberry said. “I’m glad we are being proactive.”
In August, Vitti ordered the water shut off districtwide after the results of testing found elevated levels of lead or copper at some schools.
As of mid-September, 57 out of 86 schools where test results were in had been shown to have elevated levels of lead and/or copper. An additional 10 schools had been identified last year. The district has 106 buildings.
Vitti had gone beyond the norm in ensuring that every drinking water source in every building was tested — something he said all schools should do. There’s no law requiring schools test their water.
The district’s plan is to have one hydration station for every 100 students — in addition to placing them in gyms and faculty lounges.
The hydration stations — which would be installed by next summer or the beginning of the 2019-20 school year — would allow the district to turn the drinking water back on. They also would no longer have to rely on water coolers — which have been placed in every school since the drinking water was shut off.
“The water will come from the actual pipes, and there’s a filtration system on the hydration station, so that there is zero lead, zero copper,” Vitti said last week.
The filters on the stations would have to be replaced after every 3,000 gallons of water consumption. They come with a warning system that will indicate how close the filter is to needing to be replaced. The principal, assistant principal and engineer at each school would be trained to monitor the hydration stations.
“This is the long-term solution and I think you’ll see other large urban school districts and other districts that have older buildings move in this direction in the years to come,” Vitti said. “And I think we’ll be one of the first districts to do it at this scale.”
United Way’s donation includes a $500,000 match if the district is able to raise another $500,000. A website — www.unitedwaywaterfund.org — has been created to accept donations.
Here’s a full list of the donors and their donations:
Any money that isn’t covered by donations will come out of the $90 million the district has in surplus funding.
The $3-million price tag is $1 million above what Vitti had estimated more than a month ago.
But he said last week that the $2-million cost he revealed Sept. 11 “was just a rough estimate.”
The district will likely need more hydration stations than originally anticipated, he said. And, he’s expecting some additional costs “because some buildings are older and we just want to make sure we have enough in the budget to anticipate any abatement that will have to happen, with asbestos or any other environmental issues.”
At the board meeting, Joyce Jennings — a parent with two children in the district — urged the district to have a plan in place “to deal with how construction will be handled while children, staff are in the schools while asbestos may potentially be exposed during the time of construction.”
Asmara Ruth Afework, another parent in the district, raised a similar concern, saying the timeline for installing the water hydration stations “seems ambitious.”
“We don’t want to expose the students nor the staff to that,” Afework said.
Vitti said that many universities and suburban school districts already are using water hydration stations. A September report in the Free Press noted that such stations are being piloted in Baltimore City Public Schools.
Vitti said the work the district has done in securing donations could be a model for other initiatives. He said he believes businesses “were impressed that we were proactive with identifying the problem and the solution, and that inspired them to be a part of the solution.”
That’s important, he said, because “It’s the only way we’re going to get Detroiters to stay in Detroit and get new people to move into the city — is if they’re willing to send their children to a viable school system.”
That support from the business community doesn’t necessarily have to come in the form of money. It could also be in the form of support, too, Vitti said.
In July, the district released the results of an audit of its facilities that found $500 million is needed to fix schools now. That number would rise to more than $1 billion in five years if the district doesn’t act now.
“I do think this could be a signal of what we do moving forward on a number of issues, including facilities,” Vitti said.
Contact Lori Higgins: 313-222-6651, lhiggins@freepress.com or @LoriAHiggins