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A Decade After Water Crisis, Art Brings Hope and Healing to Flint

SAN DIEGO VOICE AND VIEWPOINT — A decade after the water crisis began, health implications from ingesting the unsafe water as well as financial burdens continue to plague residents. Keyon Lovett, 34, a multi-disciplinary visual street artist, creatively known as The Art School Dropout, who moved back to Flint in 2021, says that while there is much rebuilding left to do, the community is also beaming with progress and hope — and that is, in part, due to Black artists in the city.
The post A Decade After Water Crisis, Art Brings Hope and Healing to Flint first appeared on BlackPressUSA.

Published

11 months ago

April 30, 2024

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As the community rebuilds, Black artists like Keyon Lovett are helping by promoting unity and hope.

By Nadira Jamerson, Word in Black

“Flint’s Still Fighting” is Word In Black’s series about the decade-long water crisis, and the resulting struggles and triumphs still transforming the majority-Black city.

When the water crisis hit Flint, Michigan, in 2014, residents were left with more than just contaminated pipes and brown, unsafe water flowing from their taps. The majority-Black city was also grappling with a profound lack of resources and opportunities. And as is so often the case in challenging times for the Black community, art became an outlet for expression, healing, and demanding accountability.

Ten years after the officials made the disastrous decision to switch Flint’s water supply from Detroit’s system to the Flint River to save money, Black artists are using their work to call for justice and document the city’s triumphs.

“Of course, there’s that feeling of dread because we still have a lot of dilapidated buildings and gray skies sometimes,” says Flint native Keyon Lovett, 34, a multi-disciplinary visual street artist, creatively known as The Art School Dropout. “But the hopeful thing is knowing on Friday that we have the Art Walk downtown. You can go to the Farmer’s Market and get some good food and see a show.”

Lovett didn’t plan to become an activist, but the water crisis changed the trajectory of his life. Around the time the crisis began, he left an arts program with Grand Valley State University in Allendale, Michigan, which is located two hours west of Flint near Grand Rapids. Lovett says he was unable to return home to Flint because the emergence of the water crisis meant there were few opportunities for artists in the city.

“I didn’t want to come home because the only work that would have possibly been available was working at UPS or General Motors, and my family already did that. I wasn’t trying to be the next lineage of Lovetts to be in the factory,” Lovett says.

Lovett stayed connected to what was happening in Flint through frequent trips home to visit friends and family — and what he saw began to show up in his art. In 2018, Lovett debuted “Home Sweet Home” at ArtPrize, an open, independently organized international art competition in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The live installation and accompanying documentary highlighted the realities for Flint residents during the water crisis.

“The installation I did was of me living in a house that was condemned, but I’m living off of six stacks of bottled water,” Lovett explains. “As the viewers of ArtPrize come in, they see me cooking, washing, brushing my teeth, and people would offer water because they’d see the stacks getting low. I’d say, ‘No. If I run out, I run out, because that’s how it is at home.’ That’s how it was. At the water centers, there would be days they had donations, and there would be days they don’t. People were stealing donations. People were breaking water machines.”

In the face of confusing news coverage and shame-dodging politicians who silenced many Flint residents, Lovett created the “Home Sweet Home” documentary that let Flint’s people speak the truth about the lack of access to safe and clean water.

“We filmed a short 10-minute documentary, and what I did was interview my family and friends and have them explain and share their stories on how the water crisis impacted the city, themselves, work, and everyday life,” Lovett says.

10 Years Later

A decade after the water crisis began, health implications from ingesting the unsafe water as well as financial burdens continue to plague residents. Lovett, who moved back to Flint in 2021, says that while there is much rebuilding left to do, the community is also beaming with progress and hope — and that is, in part, due to Black artists in the city.

“One of the reasons I moved back home is because of the renaissance of Black music, poetry, and art happening in Flint. A lot of Flint rappers, and singers, and artists are just being great. I wanted to come back home and be a part of that,” Lovett says.

In addition to his own work, Lovett says many other Flint organizations — from the Beats x Beers music tour, to Comma Bookstore & Social Club, and the creative co-op space Art At The Market — are using art to promote continued growth and healing.

Lovett and other artists in Flint follow in the footsteps of self-taught painter Clementine Hunter, who depicted plantation life through the 1800s, and renowned photographer Gordon Parks, who captured generations of movements for civil rights starting through the twentieth century. And as Octavia Butler said, “I began writing about power because I had so little.”

“It’s always important to have art that means something. Art that sheds a light and requires accountability,” Lovett says. “Even with the blight in the city, finding ways to put up murals, finding ways to have an initiative of Flint pride within the artwork, to even showcase a Flint artist, is important.”

The Future of Flint

Lovett says the water crisis briefly equalized Flint, forcing both the affluent and working-class residents to grapple with the same lack of accessible clean water. Now, he hopes the unity birthed from that shared struggle can leave Flint’s divisions behind for good as the city’s vibrant arts scene leads it into a culture of collective effort — and a brighter future.

“Just be one and leave all of the classism behind,” he says. “Just be Flint.”

The post A Decade After Water Crisis, Art Brings Hope and Healing to Flint first appeared on BlackPressUSA.

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COMMENTARY: Wake Up, Black Voters. Don’t Let Trump’s Lies Fool You

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Poor People’s Campaign and National Partners Announce, “Mass Poor People’s and Low-Wage Workers’ Assembly and Moral March on Washington, D.C. and to the Polls” Ahead of 2024 Elections

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Fighting to Keep Blackness

BlackPressUSA NEWSWIRE — Trump supporters have introduced another bill to take down the bright yellow letters of Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, D.C., in exchange for the name Liberty Plaza. D.C.

Published

2 weeks ago

March 7, 2025

Oakland Post

By April Ryan

As this nation observes the 60th anniversary of Bloody Sunday in Selma, Alabama, the words of President Trump reverberate. “This country will be WOKE no longer”, an emboldened Trump offered during his speech to a joint session of Congress Tuesday night. Since then, Alabama Congresswoman Terri Sewell posted on the social media platform formerly known as Twitter this morning that “Elon Musk and his DOGE bros have ordered GSA to sell off the site of the historic Freedom Riders Museum in Montgomery.” Her post of little words went on to say, “This is outrageous and we will not let it stand! I am demanding an immediate reversal. Our civil rights history is not for sale!” DOGE trying to sell Freedom Rider Museum

Also, in the news today, the Associated Press is reporting they have a file of names and descriptions of more than 26,000 military images flagged for removal because of connections to women, minorities, culture, or DEI. In more attempts to downplay Blackness, a word that is interchanged with woke, Trump supporters have introduced another bill to take down the bright yellow letters of Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, D.C., in exchange for the name Liberty Plaza. D.C. Mayor Morial Bowser is allowing the name change to keep millions of federal dollars flowing there. Black Lives Matter Plaza was named in 2020 after a tense exchange between President Trump and George Floyd protesters in front of the White House. There are more reports about cuts to equity initiatives that impact HBCU students. Programs that recruited top HBCU students into the military and the pipeline for Department of Defense contracts have been canceled.

Meanwhile, Democrats are pushing back against this second-term Trump administration’s anti-DEI and Anti-woke message. In the wake of the 60th anniversary of Bloody Sunday in Selma, several Congressional Black Caucus leaders are reintroducing the Voting Rights Act. South Carolina Democratic Congressman James Clyburn and Alabama Congresswoman Terry Sewell are sponsoring H.R. 14, the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. Six decades ago, Lewis was hit with a billy club by police as he marched for the right to vote for African Americans. The right for Black people to vote became law with the 1965 Voting Rights Act that has since been gutted, leaving the nation to vote without the full protections of the Voting Rights Act. Reflecting on the late Congressman Lewis, March 1, 2020, a few months before his death, Lewis said, “We need more than ever in these times many more someones to make good trouble- to make their own dent in the wall of injustice.”

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Rep. Al Green is Censured by The U.S. House After Protesting Trump on Medicaid

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — His censure featured no hearing at the House Ethics Committee and his punishment was put on the floor for a vote by the Republican controlled House less than 72 hours after the infraction in question.

Published

2 weeks ago

March 6, 2025

Oakland Post

By Lauren Burke

In one of the quickest punishments of a member of the U.S. House of Representatives in the modern era, Congressman Al Green (D-TX) was censured by a 224-198 vote today in the House. His censure featured no hearing at the House Ethics Committee and his punishment was put on the floor for a vote by the Republican controlled House less than 72 hours after the infraction in question. Of the last three censures of members of the U.S. House, two have been members of the Congressional Black Caucus under GOP control. In 2023, Rep. Jamal Bowman was censured.

On the night of March 4, as President Trump delivered a Joint Address to Congress, Rep. Green interrupted him twice. Rep. Green shouted, “You don’t have a mandate to cut Medicare, and you need to raise the cap on social security,” to President Trump. In another rare event, Rep. Green was escorted off the House floor by security shortly after yelling at the President by order of GOP House Speaker Mike Johnson. Over the last four years, members of Congress have yelled at President Biden during the State of the Union. Georgia Republican Marjorie Taylor-Greene was joined by Republican Rep. Lauren Bobert (R-CO) in 2022 in yelling at President Biden. In 2023, Rep. Greene, Rep. Bob Good (R-VA), and Rep. Lisa McClain (R-MI) yelled at Biden, interrupting his speech. In 2024, wearing a red MAGA hat, a violation of the rules of the U.S. House, Greene interrupted Biden again. She was never censured for her behavior. Rep. Green voted “present” on his censure and was joined by freshman Democrat Congressman Shomari Figures of Alabama who also voted “present”.

All other members of the Congressional Black Caucus voted against censuring Green. Republicans hold a four-seat advantage in the U.S. House after the death of Texas Democrat and former Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner yesterday. Ten Democrats voted along with Republicans to censure Rep. Green, including Rep. Jim Himes of Connecticut, who is in the leadership as the senior Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee. “I respect them but, I would do it again,” and “it is a matter of conscience,” Rep. Green told Black Press USA’s April Ryan in an exclusive interview on March 5. After the vote, a group of Democrats sang “We Shall Overcome” in the well at the front of the House chamber. Several Republican members attempted to shout down the singing. House Speaker Mike Johnson gaveled the House out of session and into a recess. During the brief recess members moved back to their seats and out of the well of the House. Shortly after the vote to censor Rep. Green, Republican Congressman Andy Ogles of Tennessee quickly filed legislation to punish members who participated in the singing of “We Shall Overcome.” Earlier this year, Rep. Ogles filed legislation to allow President Donald Trump to serve a third term, which is currently unconstitutional. As the debate started, the stock market dove down over one-point hours from close. The jobs report will be made public tomorrow.

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Trump Moves to Dismantle Education Department

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — The department oversees programs under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), serving 7.5 million students. Transferring IDEA oversight to another agency, as Trump’s plan suggests, could jeopardize services and protections for disabled students.

Published

2 weeks ago

March 6, 2025

Stacy M. Brown

By Stacy M. Brown
BlackPressUSA.com Senior National Correspondent
@StacyBrownMedia

The Trump administration is preparing to issue an executive order directing newly confirmed Education Secretary Linda McMahon to begin dismantling the Department of Education. While the president lacks the authority to unilaterally shut down the agency—requiring congressional approval—McMahon has been tasked with taking “all necessary steps” to reduce its role “to the maximum extent permitted by law.” The administration justifies the move by claiming the department has spent over $1 trillion since its 1979 founding without improving student achievement. However, data from The Nation’s Report Card shows math scores have improved significantly since the 1990s, though reading levels have remained stagnant. The pandemic further widened achievement gaps, leaving many students behind.

The Education Department provides about 10% of public-school funding, primarily targeting low-income students, rural districts, and children with disabilities. A recent Data for Progress poll found that 61% of voters oppose Trump’s efforts to abolish the agency, while just 34% support it. In Washington, D.C., where student proficiency rates remain low—22% in math and 34% in English—federal funding is crucial. Serenity Brooker, an elementary education major, warned that cutting the department would worsen conditions in underfunded schools.

“D.C. testing scores aren’t very high right now, so cutting the Department of Education isn’t going to help that at all,” she told Hilltop News. A report from the Education Trust found that low-income schools in D.C. receive $2,200 less per student than wealthier districts, leading to shortages in essential classroom materials. The department oversees programs under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), serving 7.5 million students. Transferring IDEA oversight to another agency, as Trump’s plan suggests, could jeopardize services and protections for disabled students.

The Office for Civil Rights also plays a key role in enforcing laws that protect students from discrimination. Moving it to the Department of Justice, as proposed in Project 2025, would make it harder for families to file complaints, leaving vulnerable students with fewer protections. Federal student aid programs, including Pell Grants and loan repayment plans, could face disruption if the department is dismantled. Experts warn this could worsen the student debt crisis, pushing more borrowers into default. “With funding cuts, they don’t have the materials they need, like books or things to help with math,” Brooker said. “It makes learning less fun for them.”