Minneapolis Drops $75k to Defend Stinky Tap Water

Cities around the nation are spending thousands in taxpayer dollars to promote tap water because of the alleged environmental problems with bottled water. But these campaigns just go to show how silly the issue has become. Minneapolis recently dropped $75,000 just to build a website encouraging people to drink only tap water. A college kid probably could have put up a site just as useful with a few hundred bucks. But governments are not that efficient! The site is part of a total $180,000 paid to a public relations firm to address this “pressing” issue. Why does Minneapolis need this campaign? Because their tap water stinks—literally! It comes from the Mississippi River and sometimes during the spring, purification techniques are not sufficient to clean out certain odors and flavors probably from algae that grow at that time of year.  City officials say it’s not unsafe, but people surely can tell it doesn’t taste good. And no government taxpayer-dollar funded PR campaign can change that. Why not try a market solution? Let people drink bottled water, and don’t nag them for making that choice. After all, much of the information on government sites complaining about bottled water is simply self-serving propaganda anyway.

For some details watch this news report below.

Photo above: Mississippi River, drinking water source for Minneapolils; source is adamsfelt photostream on Flickr.