Children in Detroit attending a rally against water shut-offs in the city on June 20, 2014.
It was six in the morning when city contractors showed up unannounced at Charity Hicks' house.
Since spring, up to 3000 Detroit households per week have been getting their water shut-off - for owing as little as $150 or two months in bills. Now it was the turn of Charity's block - and the contractor wouldn't stand to wait an hour for her pregnant neighbour to fill up some jugs.
"Where's your water termination notice?" Charity demanded, after staggering to the contractor's truck. A widely-respected African-American community leader, she has been at the forefront of campaigns to ensure Detroiters' right to public, accessible water.
The contractor's answer was to drive away, knocking Charity over and injuring her leg. Two white policemen soon arrived - not to take her report, but to arrest her. Mocking Charity for questioning the water shut-offs, they brought her to jail, where she spent two days before being released without charge.
Welcome to Detroit's water war - in which upward of 150,000 customers, late on bills that have increased 119 percent in the last decade, are now threatened with shut-offs. Local activists estimate this could impact nearly half of Detroit's mostly poor and black population - between 200,000 and 300,000 people.
"There are people who can't cook, can't clean, people coming off surgery who can't wash. This is an affront to human dignity," Charity said in an interview with Kate Levy. To make matters worse, children risk being taken by welfare authorities from any home without running water.Denying water to thousands, as a sweltering summer approaches, might be bad enough in itself. But these shut-offs are no mere exercise in cost-recovery.
Comment: Unemployment soars worldwide, with youth the most vulnerable