Poster child of Flint water crisis, Sincere Smith, doesn’t trust water 10 years later
Sincere Smith became the poster child of the Flint water crisis when he was just 2-years-old when his picture was on the cover of Time Magazine.
That was several years ago and he’s a lot older now, but his memories and scars from that time are more than skin-deep.
Not many 11-year-olds can say they’ve been on the cover of one of the world’s most popular magazines.
“The fun fact is that every time they start talking my name in class and they see that I was on a news stuff,” Sincere said.
But Sincere isn’t your typical kid. At 2-years-old, the toddler’s battered face blistered with rashes and burns was on the cover of Time Magazine’s February 2016 issue. It made him the poster child around the world for Flint’s water crisis.
TV5 has followed Sincere’s development, periodically checking in on him over the years. He is now a young boy fascinated by outer space and drawing his favorite anime characters.
His innocent mind has filtered out the sheer scope of devastation from the crisis that infamously gave him notoriety, but his own painful memories have scarred his trust in water flowing from any faucet.
“Seeing that his skins like not reacting well to being in Flint water just, it’s just like his whole mindset and being not on the Time Magazine, but actually like living through what’s going on, I think has altered his way of thinking like even here,” said Ariana Hawk, Sincere’s mom.
Hawk still uses a filter on every faucet and keeps bottled water stocked in her home, a home now outside of the city in Flint Township.
“My kids need to be reassured that the water out here is safe. And I mean, we really don’t know. I’m not testing the water out here, but I just got to take these precautionary measures in order to keep us a little bit safer,” Hawk said.
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Hawk is not convinced she will ever see a dime from the historic $626 million settlement reached years ago on behalf of Flint residents. She fears the people damaged both mentally and physically by the crisis will be forgotten.
“I think nobody gonna be held accountable. I think it’s just gonna be like it is kind of like fading away. You know, it was an eyesore for the whole country to see this one little town going through this and something that’s essential was water hadn’t taken for granted,” Hawk said.
Although Sincere rarely carries around his copy of Time Magazine like he did when TV5 talked to him four years ago, he hopes the next time he’s a cover story it’s for something truly out of this world.
“I really want to be a scientist. I want to be like someone who’s out in space, seeking out resources and stuff to go to space. I feel like space is cool,” he said.
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