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Water Infrastructure Puts Residents At Risk

Several communities in rural North Carolina struggle with water infrastructure maintenance.
Courtesy of Flickr user mycieau
Several communities in rural North Carolina struggle with water infrastructure maintenance.

A number of North Carolina communities are struggling to access safe drinking water. A WRAL investigative team tracked two decades of data and uncovered high rates of water violations, which are most pervasive in rural areas including the towns of Carthage and Butner in central North Carolina. 

With lower tax incomes from residents, businesses and manufacturing, some towns struggle to replace water infrastructure at an adequate rate to meet health and safety needs. The reporting draws connections between those towns and their struggling economies and the out-migration of residents. WRAL’s investigative reporter Cullen Browder speaks with host Frank Stasio about the report.

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Laura Pellicer is a digital reporter with WUNC’s small but intrepid digital news team.
Longtime NPR correspondent Frank Stasio was named permanent host of The State of Things in June 2006. A native of Buffalo, Frank has been in radio since the age of 19. He began his public radio career at WOI in Ames, Iowa, where he was a magazine show anchor and the station's News Director.
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