Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak (center) with Green Corps organizer Amber Collett (fourth from left) and volunteers. Mayor Rybak has signed the Think Outside the Bottle pledge.

When Corporate Accountability International decides to hold bottled water companies accountable for privatizing a public commodity they turn to Green Corps.

One of the most visible examples of corporate control of water is bottled water. It is one of the fastest growing sectors of the U.S. beverage market and is a $55 billion a year business globally. Just three corporations—Coke, Nestlé and Pepsi—make up almost half of the U.S. bottled water market. Bottled water corporations have sold people a bill of goods—positioning bottled water as healthy, when in reality it threatens our health and our ecosystems, costs thousands of times what tap water costs, and undermines local democratic control over a common resource. Water bottling is one of the least regulated industries in the U.S. and is much less regulated than our public tap water systems. Scientific studies even show that bottled water is no safer than tap water, and is sometimes less safe, containing elevated levels of arsenic, bacteria and other contaminants.

Water bottlers are taking water from underground springs and municipal sources around the world without regard to water scarcity or human rights. These corporations are taking water from local springs, aquifers and even directly from our public tap water systems—more than one-quarter of bottled water sold comes from municipal supplies. These corporations use political and economic clout to secure sweetheart deals and block legislative efforts to secure local control.

Currently, Green Corps organizers are working with Corporate Accountability International to lead a public education campaign across the country called Think Outside the Bottle. They are raising awareness of the importance of protecting public water systems, building the broad base of support needed to protect water resources over the long haul, and putting pressure on the cities to protect municipal water. In Minneapolis, a Green Corps organizer is building a broad based grassroots coalition needed to convince the mayor to cut all contracts with bottled water companies.

To raise awareness of the issue, Green Corps organizers are conducting “Tap Water Challenges” in cities nationwide, asking citizens to judge bottled water against tap water in a head-to-head taste test. These events, in conjunction with other educational forums, have generated a flood of media coverage, including the Today Show and NBC Nightly News. Rallying the support of hundreds of activists, Green Corps organizers convinced the mayor of San Francisco to cancel the city government’s bottled water contract and the mayor of Austin to issue a city-wide audit on bottled water costs. The mayors of Minneapolis, Salt Lake City, Boston, and other cities have already endorsed a pledge to support public water over bottled.