FLINT, MI -- The state's former top municipal drinking water official and the district supervisor for this area are the two unnamed Department of Environmental Quality employees suspended as a result of Flint's water crisis.
A DEQ communication to employees obtained by The Flint Journal-MLive shows Liane Shekter Smith, former chief of the department's Office of Drinking Water and Municipal Assistance, and Steve Busch, former district supervisor in the division, were suspended last week pending an investigation tied to Flint water.
Last week, a news release from Gov. Rick Snyder's office said two unnamed DEQ employees were suspended because there were "pending questions" regarding their actions related to water testing in Flint.
The Journal could not immediately reach Mel Brown, a DEQ spokeswoman, for comment on the email from Keith Creagh, director of the DEQ.
Shekter Smith was reassigned in October after former DEQ director Dan Wyant acknowledged his department enforced the wrong federal standards for treating Flint River water for more than 17 months, failing to require that the city add phosphates to the water to make it less corrosive.
Busch's name appears on a number of documents that were penned as the Flint water crisis unfolded after the city began using the Flint River as its drinking water source in 2014.
In a March 13, 2015, he wrote an email to the Genesee County Health Department, saying it was "highly unlikely that legionella would be present in treated water coming from the city of Flint treatment plant ..."
But in the 10 months since, state health officials have been unable to rule out the Flint water system as a possible source of a Legionnaires' outbreak that caused 10 deaths in parts of 2014 and 2015.
In addition to Snyder and former Flint mayor Dayne Walling, Shekter Smith and Busch were among those named as defendants in a class action lawsuit filed in November in U.S. District Court.
The lawsuit claims city and state officials supplied highly toxic water to Flint residents solely because it was cheaper than buying pre-treated Lake Huron water from the Detroit water system.