Holding the residents in the Village of Vinton hostage, that's what outside leaders accuse three council members of doing as they refuse to apply for water and wastewater grants.

Tuesday night, a representative from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, John Perkins, traveled hundreds of miles from Fort Stockton to reason with Vinton council members.

"Its been done before, why can't this community go forward with it?" said Perkins.

Council spent almost an hour Tuesday night going over decades of tests showing contamination in several water systems in Vinton. Several of the systems contain high levels of arsenic, lead and chemical 1-2- dicholoropropane. 

Perkins traveled to the troubled Vinton to ask council to approve applying for water and wastewater grants. The USDA has an open application on file from Vinton from 2009; the USDA needs council to approve moving forward and revisit the application. 

"What I've heard tonight from the citizens is that there is a need," said Perkins.

The USDA could potentially give Vinton up to $38 million in grants.

Councilmembers Juvencia Rios Ontiveros, Martha Garcia and Maria Medina again voted against it.

Perkins said he's never seen a town refuse to simply apply.

"The other communities, they are applying, they are getting funded, they're getting their projects completed and constructed," said Perkins.

Vinton residents asked them to reconsider and said the council is slowly killing them by exposing them to water with cancer-causing chemicals.

"I hope someone will hear me out in the courts, in the law. They are killing us," said Rogelio Murillo.

Ontiveros, Garcia and Medina voted to terminate village employers' retirement funds, which the village attorney advised them against because they could face another lawsuit or be charged with retaliation. 

They also voted for all Vinton officials to reimburse money used for out-of-town trips between June 2011 and the present time, even though the trips were approved when council approved the village's budget.

The village spent less than 50 percent of its travel budget for 2011 and 2012.