District addressing water quality
As follow up to our reports on the water testing that we have been conducting over the course of the past several months, I wanted to update you on the latest results from the Waterman and State Street buildings. Similar to our findings earlier in the year, we have a number of water outlets which contain levels of lead above that which the US Environmental Protection Agency sets as a maximum. If a water outlet exceeds this level, the district is required to take immediate action and either disconnect the source, replace the fixture, and/or clearly label it as non-drinking/cooking water. These actions are already underway in the 30 areas that tested above the EPA level.
Those areas are 12 outdoor faucets which require a key handle to access water, five boiler room or hallway mop closet sinks, five sinks in adult-only areas faculty and business offices, faculty prep room, faculty bathroom, two kitchen prep sinks at Waterman, two sinks in former classrooms (now storage/flex areas) at State Street, three sinks in current Waterman classrooms and one sink in shared girls/boys bathroom at Waterman
For those few areas that are in classrooms or where students might have easy access, we will disconnect the source immediately. For the vast majority of these areas, we will be changing the faucet/outlet and retesting those areas as the new law requires. All such areas will be marked as non-potable sources with student-friendly language and accompanying pictures. In addition, we continue to replace existing drinking fountains with lead filtering bottle-filling stations as an additional precaution against any ingestion of lead by our students and staff.
Should you have additional questions on the testing or the district plan, please do not hesitate to contact us. Should you have specific questions about the new law, the health risks associated with lead in drinking water, or the EPA guidelines, please see the attached Fact Sheet and associated links or call your health care provider.
Once we receive the results back from our middle and high school testing, we will share these with you as well as what our plans are for addressing the problems.
