For more than a decade, Flint residents lived under a government experiment that put cost-cutting above human life. What began as an administrative maneuver to save $5 million triggered a full-scale collapse in public trust, poisoned tens of thousands, and spotlighted exactly how little value this country places on Black, working-class communities when no one’s watching. Now, with nearly all the city’s lead pipes finally replaced and the federal emergency order lifted, the headlines read like closure. But for those who bore the weight of policy malpractice, closure is not the word.

The federal government calls it progress. State officials frame it as resolution. But for Flint, this is survival — and survival should never have been the only goal.

Eleven years ago, under state-imposed emer

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