washington — flint, michigan, residents, activists, and artists gathered in washington, d.c., on april 25 for an art showcase to call national attention to the continued effects of the city’s water crisis. the event marked four years after a state-appointed official made the ill-fated decision to switch flint’s water source to the flint river, which resulted in disastrous lead contamination.

“the city still doesn’t have water that the people can trust,” said rep. dan kildee, d-mich. “this is an anniversary that we don’t want to celebrate.”

melissa mays, a flint resident and mother of three sons, came to the nation’s capital to make sure lawmakers don’t forget the city’s plight. she said the city should serve as a warning to the rest of the country: “we know it’s not just us. we know (the contamination) is everywhere.”

earlier this month, michigan gov. rick snyder declared flint’s tap water safe to drink and officially ended the free bottled water service to local residents. while these actions may signal the city’s progress, residents remain skeptical of an infrastructure that still relies on contaminated water lines that won’t be fully replaced until 2020.

residents also face continually high water bills and health complications.

the fundred dollar bill project, an organization that draws attention to the danger of childhood lead poisoning, featured artwork from students across the country in the cannon house office building on wednesday.

the artwork is a collection of student drawings on fake dollar bills, which are supposed to serve as a reminder of the child’s value, according to founder mel chin.

flint resident ja’bari shepherd, 8, displayed his own artwork at the exhibit. his art included the drawing of a $300 bill that says, “people[’s] lives matter.”

shepherd said he wants the effects of the contamination to stop interfering with his friends’ lives “so that we can grow up and live a normal childhood like everyone else.” 

rep. kildee acknowledged there’s an irony in the project’s art considering that flint residents could use real money to help ease their mounting, costly problems.

“we know how to overcome these problems and it’s going to take resources,” he said. “the fundred project is a depiction of this problem… (but) we need the real thing.”

about two years ago, michigan decided to switch flint’s water supply from lake huron to the flint river, which, according to cnn, is a river that is notoriously known to locals for its filth. it has led to serious problems regarding lead contamination and public health risks.

fivethirtyeight reporter anna maria barry-jester explained the background of the crisis in her recent article, “what went wrong in flint.” for nearly 50 years, flint bought its water from detroit, which pumped it out of lake huron, barry-jester said. but in 2013, “the city voted to join a new pipeline being built to the lake, prompting detroit to cancel its agreement.” instead of agreeing to an updated, short-term contract with detroit, flint decided to use flint river as a water source, as an effort to save money, even though “flint’s water system hadn’t been a drain on the budget.”

this crisis has inspired college students across the nation to unite to send safe water to flint. some of the participating universities include university of michigan, university of missouri and ball state university. many have created donation drives, such as ball state university’s #freshwaterwednesday drive, to collect an abundance of bottled water to send to flint.

students of the george washington university also are fundraising for flint, though in a less traditional way — by preventing economic waste.

recently, the first-year students at gw were informed that their dining plan was changing: the freshman dining hall is no longer being offered to students beginning in the fall. thus, gw dining told current first-year students that they need to spend all of their “dining dollars,” money that only can be used at on-campus dining locations, by the end of the spring semester. in the past, excess dining dollars that were unused during the student’s first year at gw carried over into their second year, and could be used until the first semester of their third year. thus, the decision means current first-year students have only five months to spend between $700 and $1,400, depending on how much they spent this fall.

students quickly recognized this would be a challenge, considering first-year students also had $1,510 in “colonial cash,” money that can be used at off-campus restaurants. so, to avoid forfeiting their remaining dining dollars to the university at the end of the semester, students decided to purchase water bottles from their dining hall to send to flint, and put their money to good use.

gw students took their negative circumstance and made sure it had a positive outcome. have your university’s students done something similar or are they helping flint in some way? share it in the comments.

(photo by u.s. army corps of engineers)