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Flint, Michigan: Did race and poverty factor into water crisis?
Posted by CNN: Michael Martinez on January 27th, 2016
CNN: The contamination of drinking water in Flint, Michigan, has so outraged community advocates that they now pose a powerful question: Was the city neglected because it is mostly black and about 40% poor?
Several advocates say yes. They charge that Flint residents are victims of "environmental racism" -- that is, race and poverty factored into how Flint wasn't adequately protected and how its water became contaminated with lead, making the tap water undrinkable.
Flint water crisis: AG seeks to...
Nearly uncontrollable California wildfire grows, threatens 4,000 homes
Posted by CNN: Michael Martinez on May 4th, 2013
CNN: Firefighters and homeowners were anxiously awaiting to learn Saturday whether the emergence of cool ocean breezes and possible rain will weaken a Los Angeles-area wildlfire that has burned 28,000 acres in two days and now threatens 4,000 homes.
The weather change could be a mixed blessing, however, because a chance of isolated thunderstorms this weekend brings a risk of lightning sparking new fires, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said.
The Los Angeles area fire, based...
Study: Natural causes, not human activity, behind last summer’s Plains drought
Posted by CNN: Michael Martinez on April 12th, 2013
CNN: Extreme natural events, not man-made climate change, led to last summer's historic drought in the Great Plains, a new federal study said Friday. Drought occurred in six Plains states between last May and August because moist Gulf of Mexico air "failed to stream northward in late spring," and summer storms were few and stingy with rainfall, said a report by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. "Neither ocean states nor human-induced climate change, factors that can provide long-lead...