Flint’s Water Crisis Started 5 Years Ago. It’s Not Over.

The state closed its bottled water distribution sites last year. Bottles donated by Nestlé continue to be handed out, but only from a few locations and on certain days, and with no promise of it continuing past August.

Beyond the Water, Entrenched Woes

Flint’s struggles did not start with the water. In the middle of the 20th century, Flint was a small but thriving city, a hub of manufacturing where solid, middle-class jobs at General Motors were plentiful. When the automotive industry faltered, so did Flint.

After thousands of factory jobs left Flint, so did many of its residents, and neighborhoods throughout the city are still marked by blight and abandoned houses, often vandalized or taken over by squatters. The city continues to lose residents: In 2017, Flint’s population fell to 96,448. In 1960, the city was twice as big.

“Water was a symptom of this much bigger problem of a community with a really rich history that rightfully feels that it’s continually being left behind,” said Representative Dan Kildee, Democrat of Michigan, whose district includes Flint.

Though the city has been lifted by its universities and a small but energetic push to rebuild small businesses, the solid jobs in manufacturing that were lost decades ago have not been replaced. With a declining tax base, the city’s fiscal condition slid, too. Ultimately, Flint’s finances were so perilous that the state sent in emergency managers to oversee city operations, a move that irked local leaders and left many in the Democratic stronghold complaining that Gov. Rick Snyder, a Republican, was taking away local control.

An emergency manager was still guiding the city at the point at which Flint switched water sources, a decision that was aimed at saving money.

“Flint was, I think, before the water crisis, just on the edge of a crisis of some kind,” Mr. Kildee said. “And all it took was this one thing to tip the scale.”