(dogs barking) (car door closing) - [Fletcher] Hey, Gloria.

- [Gloria] Hey.

- We've got to stop meeting like this.

- [Gloria] She's got puppies.

- Okay.

Hey, pup.

Hey, don't eat me alive.

(dogs barking) (door closing) (dogs barking) So I printed them and got on the road to Juliette because I wanted to give y'alls...

I went to Amber's first and I'm just going down the road.

Let me find you - just have my notes - okay you're 32.

(television voices talking faintly) You're the second highest that I've tested.

- [Gloria] I was afraid of that.

- I haven't had a chance, I just saw that number.

This is measuring total chromium.

So you have 12.2 total chromium, 9.8 of it's hexavalent.

(Gloria murmurs) I don't know if this is chromium zero or chromium three, but it might be chromium zero.

This is about 490 times over the California public health limit.

- [Gloria] Mm-hmm.

I can't tell you that's what happened to Cason.

I knew when he died it wasn't fine.

I knew when everybody on this road was dying, it wasn't damn fine.

And I guarantee they didn't test none of them damn wells.

(Fletcher sighs) (Gloria sniffles) - You're not drinking the water, right?

- No, I got bottled water in there and I got a gallon of water and I got all that.

I appreciate it, thank you.

Thank you for all you're doing for us.

- [Gloria] We appreciate it.

- Bye Gloria.

(engine turning over) (seatbelt warning beeping) - [Pastor] There's no poisoned water in God's kingdom, and God doesn't wish that the people of the earth, or God's creation, would drink that water.

Over and over again we're promised living, clean water.

To keep water clean is to live into the gospel of Jesus Christ.

- [Parishioner] How you doing, Marvin?

- [Parishioner 2] All right.

- [Parishioner] Good to see you, good to see you.

- There's a place right here and a place right here to sign on paper.

- [Fletcher] Plant Scherer is the largest coal-burning facility in the Western hemisphere.

It's certainly the biggest one in the country.

Everyone that is living within an area of about two-mile radius of the plant property receives their drinking water from private wells that are in the same aquifer that that coal ash is submerged 75 feet into.

Federal rules came down in 2015, that required all of these electric utilities to have to start putting monitoring wells around their plant property and disclosing the information publicly on their website.

A few months after they installed those wells, they started buying up property adjacent to the plant.

And that's the first time that our organization really started looking into this.

The stuff that we found in those tests were certainly not things that we would want to drink.

- [Fletcher] Aluminum, mercury, arsenic, barium, boron, cobalt, lead, manganese, strontium, sulfate and fluoride.

This can cause cancer, or logic issues, reproductive issues.

It can delay mental growth in children and stunt physical growth.

It causes gastrointestinal issues, on down the line.

The most concerning thing that we're finding in drinking water wells is the chemical or heavy metal called hexavalent chromium.

There's no federal standard for hexavalent chromium on its own.

There's two states in the union that have applied limits to hexavalent chromium.

Does anybody know a movie called Erin Brockovich?

(crowd murmurs) So because of the Brockovich case, California put a limit on the amount of hexavalent chromium that could be acceptable in drinking water.

That limit is 0.02 parts per billion.

We found as high as 10.4 parts per billion in Juliette.

That's 505 times California limit.

Yes, sir.

- Have you tested any wells on Dames Ferry Road?

- [Fletcher] Yes, sir.

(crowd softly murmurs) - Found it good or bad?

(crowd murmurs) - The most contaminated well that I've tested is on Dames Ferry Road.

- Most of the contaminated ones are on Dames Ferry Road?

- [Attendee] Have you tested any on McCracken Street?

- [Fletcher] I think I've tested the majority of houses on McCracken Street.

- This district here of Juliette, probably brings in more tax money than any district in Monroe County.

So why can't they use some of that Georgia Power tax money to build a water line.

- [Attendee] Exactly.

- [Gregory] Well, the biggest problem is- - Well, that's right, well.

- The biggest issue for bringing water up here is the amount of the distance he was talking about.

You're talking about $150,000 for every mile of waterline.

So you're talking about hundreds of thousands just to get it in the area.

- That's right, to save a few lives.

The way it works now is causing cancer.

- If you put money value on everything, how much money value is on one life?

- [Attendees] Amen!

(crowd clapping) - [Gregory] I didn't say wasn't willing to do it sir, that's not really fair to say.

Right now is just when I'm learning.

I came here tonight to listen and to learn.

- [Fletcher] Yes, sir.

He cared enough to show up and listen, y'all.

- [George] Thank you.

(crowd clapping) - [Attendee] We don't need a five-year plan.

We need an immediate plan.

- [Fletcher] I think they hear you.

(crowd clapping) (crowd chattering) (car whooshing past) - [Gini] My dad helped to build Georgia Power in the '80s.

(soft piano music) It was a huge employer in this community.

- I think Georgia Power has positively impacted the community.

The amount of taxes that go towards the community and what that money is used for.

But now I think people are starting to understand that, what amount of money makes any water contamination worth it?

- [Mike] About 1880, the very first coal-fired electric generating plants were started.

Early on, even back in the UK, they recognize the fact that coal ash is really bad.

They had to stop the issue of that coal ash flying around and people breathing it in and getting in their eyes, et cetera.

So they came up with, which all of us would, we used to say, well, we need to stop this stuff from flying around, well let's get it wet.

Obviously the more of it you create, you end up realizing, well, we need to dig a pit and put it in there and keep water on top of it.

Then we'd dump it in there, it gets wet, and we're all good.

The only problem with that is that it created a different kind of problem.

One that's not quite as obvious, but is just as sinister.

(soft piano music) (birds chirping) (wind blowing) - [Fletcher] So you said you've been here since...?

- [Interviewee] 2013.

- [Fletcher] Thirteen.

- Do you drink the tap water or drink bottled water?

- I drink tap water like it's going out of style.

- [Fletcher] Okay.

You cook with it too?

- [Fletcher] I know you haven't been to the meetings, but do you have a general idea of what we're doing and why we're doing it?

- Somewhat I've been reading what Pam's been putting on the Juliette news.

Me and my husband both are kind of upset about it because if that's the case for me, I'm gonna have to have a hysterectomy.

We're pretty upset because we're never going to have a kid together.

- Have children again.

- Yeah, and we don't understand why, cause we both have children with other people, and all of a sudden we can't have none together.

- Do you have any other health issues or is that kinda- - [Interviewee] I have two tumors on my thyroid as well.

- [Fletcher] Have they done any blood work on you for heavy metals?

- No, they have not.

- [Fletcher] You got insurance?

- Mm-hmm.

- [Fletcher] You need to ask them to.

- Okay.

(dog barks) Can you help me turn that on cold?

(boots clomping) (tap water running) - What we know, what we can prove, the problem is that, that ash pond, if this is the aquifer, right, the bottom of that ash pond is submerged about 25 feet into the aquifer.

There's no liner, there's nothing protecting it.

That's the same aquifer that you're drawing your drinking water from.

- [Narrator] It's well-established that coal ash is toxic.

It's well-established that some of the heavy metals can either dissolve or move rapidly through water systems and that different people are gonna be affected by it in different ways.

- [Fletcher] So what we're taking samples of, this is for hexavalent chromium.

- Mm-hmm.

- This is for sulfate.

- And this is for nickel, lead, mercury, all your typical heavy metals.

Some of these people are sick because they're just sick.

But when you hear out of 90-ish houses that I've tested and well over 50% of the people have some sort of chronic illness that, according to symptoms and what I've researched on toxicology of these things could be linked to some of these coal ash constituents.

Here's this, it's just an information sheet about what we're doing and why we're- - Hey, Lindsey?

Hey, Fletcher Sams.

Hey, y'all.

- [Resident] Fletcher, how are you?

- I'm exhausted.

How are y'all?

- [Resident 2] We're doing good.

You need something else to drink?

- [Fletcher] Not your water, if you've got 17.

- [Resident] Okay let me tell you, we have our new machine.

- [Fletcher] Okay, good, high five.

It's bittersweet because a lot of these people have welcomed me into their homes and broken bread with me and introduced me to their friends and to their family, but under circumstances that I'd really rather not have met them under.

(faucet running) They want answers to, "Why is my daughter born with cancer?"

Or, "Why does my son have cancer?"

Or, "Why am I dying?"

While I'm not able to give them all the answers, I'm able to start giving them more answers than what they had before.

- [Interviewer] Yes.

- Y'all have any health issues?

(residents chuckle) - I've had breast cancer.

Colonoscopy two years ago and they got six polyps off.

- [Fletcher] How do I turn on the cold water?

(water running) - I don't know if this is water, but with me, I've been getting random skin- - [Fletcher] Rashes?

- Yes, like here, I'll get them at my hairline.

- [Fletcher] You and everybody else.

- When I went to Emory for my pituitary tumor, they were all trying to figure out where it came from, because the type I have, they said they don't never normally find it until you're in your 50s or 60s just cause it's just a slow growing.

Like I said, they still were trying to figure out what caused it to grow so fast.

- On January 2nd, I had an MRI done and it showed concerns for sarcoma, which is a very rare cancer.

Then last week I had a CT scan and there's four nodules in my lung.

We don't know what they are yet, but yeah.

- I know you can't tell Fletcher, but how long have you been in the water site around here?

- Decades.

- You think it's been that long?

- Yeah.

- So I've probably been drinking it for 14 years.

- Yeah.

- That's crazy, man.

That's crazy to think about that.

- Regardless of the source or whether or not we're able to prove beyond any shadow of any doubt that the same stuff that's leaking out of these ponds in the monitoring wells is the same thing that's showing up in the wells actually from, you know?

It's more that the stuff that is in the well, regardless of where the source is, is killing people.

- Everyone here in our community, because we live so far out from everything, we rely on what's in the ground.

And to know that that is contaminated is hard.

Are you familiar with what's going on with the contaminated water?

- Yes.

- Are you all familiar with the ground water issues we're having out here?

- I've heard.

- Okay.

This meeting will inform you of everything you need to know about what's going on.

- [Resident] Okay.

- Us two will be there.

He developed a very rare form of leukemia 10 years ago.

And, we don't know.

We have 60 acres, borders Georgia Power.

(John knocking on door) - [Resident] What's up?

- Hey, how are you?

- [Resident] Good.

- Are you familiar with what's going on with the local water?

Are you familiar with what's going on with the local water?

Okay.

Would you be interested in coming to a meeting where we can explain what's going on?

All right.

Thank you very much.

- [Resident] Mm-hmm.

(door closing) It's just hard to believe that you would allow things to go like that if you know that it's contaminating your neighbors.

As soon as I found out the issue, my first thoughts were, "What can I do to fix it?

And who do I have to talk to?

I need more information."

So I made sure whatever I had to do, I was at those meetings.

(wheels sloshing) - We all have kids.

I know John has five and I have four, and I haven't got my water test back yet.

But it's especially concerning to me that my girls have been drinking that for five years.

Just listening to the State of the Union address this week, President Trump said that one of his goals is to get internet out to rural areas.

Well if his goal is to get internet, how much more important is water?

So, contact your state and not even just state, but I sent a letter to President Trump today.

I'm really trying everything I can.

(audience clapping) - They choose one plant, to make them fix it correctly, and don't make the other plants do it.

- [Fletcher] Because of people like y'all in this room.

We know that public pressure, like what y'all are doing tonight, changed the plan at Plant Branch.

Their plan was to leave it in place there.

- [Tim] We decided to accept their plan to cap this particular coal ash pond in place.

- [Attendee] Why?

- We've accepted their plan, if they want it to excavate that and line it, and they presented that, that would have been something that we could have voted on and made a decision.

It would be, I imagine, probably another billion dollars, maybe two to do, they're so large.

But that was not the plan they wanted to move forward with.

The EPD is making the decision on that.

And if the EPD affirms that that's the way to go, then that will be what happens.

- Even though Georgia Power made the request just to cap it off and not put a liner?

Y'all don't have a say so?

- [Tim] Our job is to make sure that they're in compliance.

- How do we throw a wrench in that and stop that plan in light of all this new evidence that's come out?

- The EPD will make the decision.

So it's the EPD that's your next stop.

- Rate payers aren't required to pay for environmental compliance, especially if it's something that they've known is an issue for decades and not done anything about.

So for him to say if Georgia Power would have come to him with a different plan then he would have provided funding for that, which is, I think, verbatim what he said.

That's shocking.

Y'all are across the street from the entrance to the plant, correct?

- [Caller] Right, right.

Okay.

All right.

I will see you in about five, maybe six minutes.

- [Caller] Okay, sounds good, thank you.

- [Fletcher] Okay, all right, bye.

- [Caller] All right, bye-bye.

- Okay, so look, you're at CH 33.

- It is tied at the very highest that we found so far.

- The worst?

- Yeah.

- Wow!

Congratulations to us.

(interviewee chuckles) What's going on?

- Y'all are directly in between the ash pond and the river.

And when y'all came out here, I told you that's what I was worried about.

And it's a deep well.

- 350 feet.

- I've been told.

- [Fletcher] Essentially there's only two states in the union that have put a limit on hexavalent chromium.

Georgia's obviously not one of them.

California, based on the Brockovich case, decided that the one in a million cancer risk is 0.02.

- You're at 10.4.

- [Fletcher] You're at about one in 2000.

(Interviewee mutters) - One in 2,000?

- I was hoping for better.

We've been drinking it for 20 years.

What are people's alternatives?

Where do you move against somebody like Georgia Power, running into this.

- [Fletcher] There's legal avenues that y'all can take, that's an option.

There is legislative stuff that we're trying to get them to excavate and remove.

- You've heard it all I've heard and I've talked with an awful lot of people who've sold out or what's been going on.

And I've heard a lot of things hearsay about what Georgia Power will and will not do.

- There's a lot of urban legends and everything like that.

- Well I talk to people specifically, it's not like I didn't hear it from the next guy.

But he was really surprised, and this was a year and a half ago, two years ago, was really surprised that I was down here.

Because he told me Georgia Power wanted everything between them and the river.

- I bet they did.

- They've never approached us.

They've never approached us.

- They got a lot of media heat- - Okay, all right.

I'm sorry, go ahead.

- So they got a lot of media heat when they started buying those houses, so they stopped.

It was not a good look.

- [Stacey] Several years ago, and it went on for a long time, Georgia Power spent a lot of money buying up property around the plant and they paid multiples of what the property was worth.

- [Fletcher] They installed the groundwater monitoring wells in 2015 and literally one person was telling me that her grandmother saw the well go in, two months later, there was a knock on her door.

- And then literally, what they would do, sometimes on the very same day of the closing is they would go in, knock the house down, and fill the well up with cement.

So that again, we believe, no one could test and see what was there.

- Everyone that I've seen so far, they go in, tear the house down, pour the well full of concrete.

In most cases- - Put a chain across the driveway.

- Put a chain across the driveway.

And in a lot of cases, put up a fence and put up "no trespassing" signs.

- [Fletcher] When you drive down Luther Smith Road and you see where someone's mailbox used to be, and then right across the street, you see a monitoring well, you really get an idea of the proximity of it.

- [Interviewee] It's like acres and acres of land that they bought.

It's right down the road from our house.

I mentioned that I took my five-year-old to the doctor.

I was driving home from a doctor's appointment, already kind of shaken up about what could be going on, have I been giving my girls contaminated water for all these years and just kind of internally freaking out, but she was in the backseat and I didn't want to concern her and I still don't want her to be really worried.

Then I drive by where those houses were, and I see that sign, and it hit me, that's half of a mile from our house.

I guess it wasn't until that point that I realized how close all of the contaminated water issues are to us.

- What's up, bro?

- [Fletcher] Hey man, what's going on?

- [Interviewee] Not a whole lot.

- They didn't detect any chromium three.

They only detected the hex chrome, right?

- Right.

Well you've given us a good starting point.

- Thank you for doing this.

- [Fletcher] Well, we've got more answers than we had, but we still don't have anywhere close to the answers.

- [Interviewee] Thanks, Fletcher.

See you soon.

Please tell your wife thank you for - - [Interviewee 2] The sacrifice.

- Giving you.

- Oh yeah?

- I know it's probably hard on her.

- She's like, "You know I didn't talk to you once on Valentine's Day, I just passed out on the couch."

- You're a horrible valentine.

- Yeah, basically.

I need to bring her out here and meet everybody.

- Yeah, we'd love to meet her, and our girls can play together.

- Oh yeah, I've got a little girl who's seven, a little girl who's five.

- [Child] Hey I'm seven.

- [Child 2] Mom, she's seven.

(Interviewee chuckles) - [Interviewee 2] It works out.

- I feel like have to keep doing this, you know what I mean?

At the pace that I'm doing it.

(bus idling) - All right, we're ready to rock.

- Georgia Power has applied for permits to close the ash pond.

The House bill and the Senate bill that was just introduced, that will require them to put it into a lined facility, take that ash and put it into a lined facility.

- We will get some folks that will help us today.

But we are gonna get a lot of folks that say, well, we need to consider the facts.

Here are the facts.

The federal government does not treat coal ash as hazardous waste, even though it's full of known carcinogens and heavy metals and very toxic material.

The utility industry has lobbied heavily against regulation.

Because of that, you have a lot of laws that are aimed at not regulating the utility.

One being, it's cheaper to dump coal ash into a landfill here than it is household garbage.

So while all these other utilities are excavating their ash, instead of storing it onsite at those plants away from the water and a liner, they're importing it to Georgia.

(crowd chattering) - [Participant] Some legislators will want to pull you off to the side and talk, if you get turned around, this is the House side, and this is the Senate side.

- [Participant] Have you been given this information?

- [Congressman] No, no I have not.

- Okay, will you take it please?

- Oh I'd (indistinct) to take it.

I've been looking for it.

- I know you know, cause we've been emailing you and calling you, and talking to you about our wells.

- All right, I've been working with the representative in Washington- - I was just dealing with the coal ash issue.

- We have the report with us, we'd like you to have that.

- Okay.

Thank you, big man.

- The big concern for me, especially because we have four little girls, and we've been drinking this water.

- Mine was not at their desk.

- They wouldn't talk.

- Mary something, she won't see me.

She said she's not my district.

I said that doesn't make any difference.

I want her vote.

- That's right.

- Y'all on a well?

- We are and there's no access to public water.

- Have they offered to run any kind of water lines out there or anything?

- I've talked to my county commissioners and they're trying to work on something, but they were quoted a rough estimate of about $30 million to bring the water lines out.

- I didn't know if Georgia Power had helped.

- Oh no, they have not.

They're not offering anything at this point.

- They're excavating some ponds in the state, but they're not excavating Plant Scherer, and we want to know why.

- I'm going to hear it in committee, you still come to our committee and we're gonna hear some testimony of information about it.

So I'm looking forward to getting information, this is the first really, I don't know what all this is.

(Bell ringing) - So I have strontium, barium, sulfate and hexavalent chromium.

- Wow.

Sounds like scary stuff.

- [Participant] It is, it's very, very scary stuff.

(crowd chattering) - If these bills don't pass, if we're not able to really spell it out in big block letter crayon for the people that can't read the existing federal law, Georgia EPD will issue the permit to close in place.

Georgia Power would then have a shield saying, "Oh, well we have a legal permit to sit here and pollute the groundwater in perpetuity and be a good neighbor doing it.

But we have a legal permit to do that, and so you can't touch us."

- We've reached out to the EPD.

We've reached out to the representative.

We reached out to local.

Our next step is a governor.

We need help.

The contamination is coming from the ash pond being submerged into our aquifer.

That's the reason our water's contaminated.

If it wasn't for the ash pond being in the groundwater in our aquifer, our water would be fine.

- Feeding the pets, the livestock, watering the gardens, we need water.

We cannot use our tap water anymore.

- So we want the ash pond excavated.

We want to put in the lined facility like yours and my trash at my house gets put in.

I throw banana peels and stuff in my trash.

I throw teabags in my trash and I can't go just dump into my yard.

It has to go to a lined landfill.

Toxic coal ash could be just dropped right into the aquifer at my house.

- [Attendee] Cause that's what they're doing.

That's what they want to do.

They want to cap it and leave it in place forever.

We want it out.

- People are dying.

They've got cancer.

They couldn't even come to speak today.

- We had 15 families on Luther Smith Road.

- Nine have cancer.

- Six died.

Three are still fighting cancer.

That is out of 15 families, a small little road.

It's not even a mile long.

- It's a community and it's not just Juliette.

- This is a Georgia problem.

- That's right.

- There are 19 other ash ponds.

- It does seem to us that Brian Kemp has the ability to compel EPD to look at this legitimately.

- Monroe County is pretty Republican.

- [Attendee] How many people in here voted for Brian Kemp and are Republican?

How many people will convert to Democrat if we don't get them out?

(crowd chattering) (crowd clapping) - I was just saying, if there was someone that we should reach out to with our policy folks and get more information from y'all, gonna be happy to do that.

- Yeah, I'll write my name on here.

- [Attendee] So is it not possible to see him today?

- I'm sorry, m'am.

He has a back-to-back schedule.

- [Attendee] What about tomorrow?

- I'm not able to commit to that.

- He can't be reached.

And it's a shame because I elected him.

- [Participant] Ditto.

- I won't support a Republican party that sits on their hand while this happens.

- Bottom line, this shouldn't be a partisan issue, this shouldn't even be a political issue.

This is a moral issue.

Do the right thing.

- EPD is not gonna do anything.

These legislators aren't gonna do anything.

What they're gonna do is they're gonna hit me and say that this is all a political stunt, that we're trying to flip Monroe County.

I had two reporters call over and be like, "They're trying to paint you as doing this."

- [Attendee] Doing what?

- Trying to flip Monroe county into changing y'all to a bunch of liberals.

- You know I'm a Democrat.

- They're gonna start attacking me.

It's all a distraction from the issue.

It's obvious.

It is submersed in the aquifer.

The standard for the close-in-place is that it cannot be in contact with groundwater.

It cannot have even the possibility of coming into contact with groundwater and they're going to store it 25 feet into the aquifer.

We have proof of that, and they're wanting more proof.

Next thing they're going to be wanting blood samples from y'all, and try to prove that away.

- We're dealing with a gigantic utility with the most powerful lobby in the states.

And this is the way that it is.

And this is the way that we want it to go.

And you're dealing with a government that wants to say, "All right, yes sir, we'll do that."

But what we're trying to tell those lawmakers and regulators is that what you're proposing does not follow the rule of law.

What we're trying to do right here is save everybody a whole lot of time and money and heartache.

Because we're gonna get there.

We're not going anywhere.

These citizens in Juliette are not gonna shut up.

We're going to get this moved to a lined and capped facility.

How much do you want to fight us?

- I'm going as fast as I can.

We have two more bottles, two more bottles.

(Participants chatting softly) - Got it?

- Yeah, I got it.

(children talking) (engine running) (car trunk closing) (crowd chattering) - We want the ponds to be excavated and we want clean water for the people in this community.

- I'd like to know what you expect the County Commissioner to do.

We had a meeting the other night.

- [Presenter] Right.

- This just came on me last three weeks.

I didn't know fly ash from wet ash, any of that stuff.

But I've researched a lot since you brought that up.

My main concern, if we got bad water out there, I want to get water to the people out there.

- [Participant] Do any of y'all want to pay for running water lines...to me?

Because Georgia Power contaminated my well.

- Let me ask you something.

Do you realize all y'all people in here that are taxpayers of Monroe County, do you realize you're subsidizing the water system in Monroe County right now?

So why don't we tax and put everybody on water because heaven knows when they're gonna get this problem fixed.

- [Participant 2] No!

Hey, why don't you take the money from Georgia Power on taxes and pay for the water line?

(crowd cheering) (crowd clapping) - Mr. Ambrose, you asked, "What do you want me to do?"

That was one of the first things you said when you stood up, "What do you want me to do?"

I want you to do something.

Something.

(crowd chattering) (participants chattering faintly) (birds chirping) - We started out hearing about problems with wells here in the area.

We've got about 800 properties that all have a well on them that don't have any city or county water available.

So we got together and started working on it.

This was the start of a 16 to $17 million project to bring clean water to the residents around Lake Juliette.

- They're following all the right rules and regulations, the EPA and EPD has set up.

But I think the rules and regulations dealing with this coal ash needs to be re-looked at, because a lot of states are forcing them to remove it because there's some dangerous stuff.

And if they're going to put it right on the waterway like that, but our hands are tied.

And if we waited to put this water in until some kind of settlement was made, it might be 10 years.

(birds chirping) (wind blowing) - Given the situation, the fact that the county commissioners saw a need to be able to try to get water out to this community, to help them with the situation, I think is wonderful.

That's good.

I think it's tragic that it has to happen.

They're making the best of the situation, given the situation that they did not create.

- We're very happy that our county commissioners have understood what's going on and are moving in the direction of getting us all water.

But the reason it isn't enough is because there are 15 million tons of coal ash sitting in my backyard that are contaminating the waters in this community.

Something needs to be done about that.

- They were fighting at the legislature.

They were fighting, asking their representatives, who are there to represent them, not Georgia Power, asking them to do something to make their situation better.

They have been through efforts with The Riverkeepers and the Southern Environmental Law Center asking the Environmental Protection Agency to not approve the permit to allow Georgia Power to cap this pond in place without a liner.

They're just trying to make things better going forward, and no one is listening.

So, when you're left with no other option, you file a lawsuit.

(dogs barking) (gravel crunching) - This is not talking about saving some kind of rare salamander.

This is about people's lives, and that's just a different thing.

When most people think of environmental issues, they think it's like some tree hugger out here trying to save some rare species, and it's not.

I'm trying to save people.

Real quick, do you mind if we come get another sample tomorrow, the experts we're working with want two samples.

- [Caller] The gate will be locked, but Pat nextdoor will let you drive through his backyard and you can come over to my yard.

- Okay, all right, cut through Pat's yard.

Got it.

- [Caller] Yeah.

- All right, will do.

- [Caller] Okay, buddy.

- All right.

Thanks.

- [Caller] Yes, sir.

Bye.

- All right, bye.

Everybody's related, everybody knows everybody and everybody knows what I'm doing and it's a special place.

(engine running) (metal clanking) (dog barking) (voters chatting softly) - I'm just thinking about the future.

I'm going to be part of the past soon.

(soft music) It just worries me about, you know, the future.

Will it ever be good water again?

(slow, soft music)