Emails show Michigan Gov. Snyder's aides warned about degraded water quality in Flint early on

The story of malignant negligence in Flint, Michigan, keeps getting worse. In a review of 550 emails released by Michigan’s Republican Gov. Rick Snyder this week, Detroit Free Press reporters Matthew Dolan and Paul Egan found that the governor was informed early on after Flint stopped getting its drinking water from the Detroit water system and switched to the Flint River as a source that the city’s water quality plunged.

The emails also showed that an effort was made at the time to keep the state’s Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) out of the loop so that tainted-water worries would not be subject to discovery via the Freedom of Information Act. Michigan exempts the governor's office and legislature from public records disclosure. The governor began releasing another 6,000-8,000 emails Friday, so more revelations can be expected.

As a consequence of the switch to Flint River water in 2014, at least 100,000 city residents drank lead-contaminated water for more than a year. In September, a pediatrician found a spike in lead levels in Flint children. Lead contamination in tiny amounts is a powerful neurotoxin that can cause irreversible brain damage and other developmental problems in children. Many scientists say there is no safe level.