'People Are Literally Being Poisoned': How Sewage Problems in Alabama Got So Bad -- and Why Other States Should Worry

Governing: Alabama’s Lowndes County, which lies between Selma and Montgomery, has been coping with basic sewage problems for decades.

Most residents of this rural county, who are predominantly poor and black, live too far from cities to attach their homes to sewer systems. So they rely on septic tanks. But installing and maintaining those septic systems is difficult -- not only because they're so expensive but also because they have to be specially designed to work in the region's clay-rich soil.

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