Environmental justice with Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha
In April 2014, officials in Flint, Michigan, switched the source of the city鈥檚 water from the Detroit water supply to the Flint, River. It was a cost-saving move, but it touched the lives of citizens across that city. Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha helped blow the story open. With science and determination, she proved the decision was poisoning the children of Flint.
An associate professor of pediatrics and human development at Michigan State University, Dr. Mona is also the founder and director of the Michigan State University and Hurley Children鈥檚 Hospital Pediatric Public Health Initiative, a model program to mitigate the impact of the Flint water crisis so that all Flint children grow up healthy and strong. She is also the author of What the Eyes Don鈥檛 See, a memoir of her role in exposing the Flint water crisis, which was the Rhode Island Center for the Book鈥檚 selection for Read Across Rhode Island, it鈥檚 annual state-wide read.
"Story in the Public Square" broadcasts each week on public television stations across the United States. In Rhode Island and southeastern New England, the show is broadcast on Rhode Island PBS on Sundays at 11 a.m. and is rebroadcast Thursdays at 7:30 p.m. An audio version of the program airs 8:30 a.m. & 6:30 p.m. ET, Sundays at 4:30 a.m. & 11:30 p.m. ET on SiriusXM鈥檚 popular P.O.T.U.S. (Politics of the United States), channel 124. 鈥淪tory in the Public Square鈥 is a partnership between the Pell Center and The Providence Journal. The initiative aims to study, celebrate and tell stories that matter.