Pollution and politics

Lately I've been hooked on politics,
watching the different candidates . . .
I go thru these spells where I think if only . . .
then . . .

Of course, the then never happens.

I have had so many bad experiences with politicians
and so much hope for so many of them . . . at all levels.
From the local on up. You'd think I'd learn.

For example, on the local level,
I remember ages ago, once upon a time,
when my kids were little, maybe 6 and 8 years old,
we met the mayor of Shaker Heights.
Pat Mearns. She was nice, and she chatted with me
and my kids. Jim had known her daughter in law school,
and had even attended her daughter's wedding,
and this was back in the days when he was a lawyer
at a huge firm in Cleveland. So for some reason,
I (mistakenly) felt almost connected to the mayor.
She was, after all, nice, young, Democratic, accessible,
and she always acted as if she knew me.


A year later, the creek behind our house became polluted.
Maybe it always was. But there was a drought that year,
and with it came an aroma of shit in our creek, so strong
it could knock you out. I didn't like opening the windows.
I didn't let the kids play back there.

I had the city come out and investigate many times.
They flushed the creek every time, which meant they flooded it
to wash out the offending odor.
Of course, the scent returned in a day or two.

I called the city, the sewer district (NEORSD), the Ohio EPA . . .
No one did a thing, although the NEORSD did finally test the water
and concluded that the fecal count was extremely high.
(They didn't want to release the results to me and refused for months . . . )

So Suzanne decided to write the mayor. After all, S remembered
she'd met the mayor. And the mayor had said to her:
if you ever have any questions about our city,
just ask me. Mayors take care of cities.
Suzanne loved to write letters. And she loved the idea
of a person who takes care of cities.
The mayor had made quite an impression on her.

So she wrote the mayor: Dear Mayor,
You met me at the pool. I was wearing a pink swim suit. Remember?
You said to write if I had a question. I wanted to tell you
our creek is dirty. It has poop in it. It killed my frogs.
It smells like a toilet no one flushes.
Can you fix it?

A week later the mayor wrote back.
Dear Suzanne,
Your creek is not in my city. It's in Beachwood.

????
The letter was addressed to our home
which did have a Shaker Heights address . . .

It is true that our creek ran through Shaker and Beachwood.


It took about three years before the EPA was ready to act.
About ten years later, the problem was fixed.
We had long since moved.