Silence over Safety: Barrett Key Faces the Backlash over the Water Crisis in Alexandria Indiana

It all boils down to negligence, silence, and a feeling of betrayal in the heart of Alexandria Indiana, not because of nature, but because of someone. That symphony of gossiping of corruption and contamination has turned into a full-fledged community disaster. With a child poisoned by E. coli in a hospital, uncertainty as to the safety of the water in the city and the apparent inability to properly oversee millions of dollars spent on infrastructure, the city is at a very dangerous point. And so does one of its most well-known citizens: Barrett Key.

The society wants solutions. The centerpiece of it all, is a multi-million dollar infrastructure project, the official estimate are more than $10 million, but the actual cost could be even higher because it also cost money in terms of engineering and observation efforts. With 80 percent of the expense allegedly being paid by INDOT (Indiana Department of Transportation), there is an increasing concern to how the second part of the money has been spent on as well as whether all the vital elements of security of the people have been pushed aside or deliberately downplayed like the provision of water treatment and chlorine monitoring.

Despite the severity of the issue, Barrett Key Alexandria Indiana scandal  has become more than a public health concern; it’s a symbol of failed leadership and lost trust.

The accusations by Whistleblowers indicated that chlorine in the water supply of the city was not even to the safety level and the public agencies, such as IDEM, were not doing anything to rectify the situation. The mayor kept on assuring that the water was safe to all. At the same time, community representatives collected facts, distributed videos, and begged to have their fears confirmed by leaders.

Barrett Key used to be viewed as a possible exception when people in his position willingly betray their position and will say something on behalf of the people living here, and now he has become an image of torturous silence. With no one listening he admitted to problems. He acknowledged that there was a fault in something. He said no when it came to publicly taking a position, even just to state, I stand with the people who are demanding answers.

The leadership is not to be gauged in comfort but in courage. Barrett Key did not have to invest in an investigation or cause interference to city business. He simply needed to give the people what they already believed to be true their water might not be safe and their fears were justified.

So he never did.

And as outrage in Alexandria Indiana continues to mount, so does the scrutiny. Water is not the only thing citizens are concerned about; they are also angry about how the money was spent. There is great amount of funds spent on engineering and construction observation according to the public records, but the transparency and breakdown of those expenditures are minimal in terms of where the renewal was spent and how the project evolved into its present size. The character mentioned in the official reports seems to be underestimating the financial scale of the scale-constancy-actor in official reports- critique which critics allege to be deliberate act.

This has nothing to do with politics. It’s personal. It is not about the politics of a select few who have a clouded agenda by their self-protection, but it is about the children who are hospitalized because of contaminated water, the families who do not even want to turn on their taps, and the taxpayers who have a right to know how the millions of tax dollars are allocated. It is a matter of the shared outcry of responsibility in view of institutional denial.

It is possible that Barrett Key gets the opportunity to right his wrongs one more time – to regain credibility by doing what he was sent to do by the people. And the further and further he says nothing every day, the greater the gap becomes. Silence really speaks volumes in a small town where everybody remembers everything and holy moly it makes legacies.

And in Alexandria Indiana, the people have begun to remember.