new for @starledger.bsky.social, health reporter Jackie Roman and I spent a couple of months speaking with former and current inmates about what they called unsafe and “dirty” water quality at #NewJersey prisons. Activists, including @cleanwaternj.bsky.social, are calling for an investigation
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Between 2020-March 2025, @stateofnewjersey.bsky.social bought 553,412 cases of water for inmates.
That’s 13 million+ bottles of taxpayer-funded water costing $2.5M, according to public records requests.
Publicly available data showed citations & dozens of water monitoring or reporting lapses at the public water systems associated with several prisons.