Getting out on Christmas break Schools, day cares find lead
Regulatory vacuum puts children at risk
Almost two weeks into the school year, Melissa Corrigan got an email from the principal and superintendent of her daughters’ elementary school.
Water from four West Middleton Elementary School faucets taken Sept. 1, the first day of school, had tested high for levels of lead or copper. As a safety precaution, the school would provide bottled water to students until the issue was resolved.
Corrigan — whose daughters Brooklyn and Carly are in first and fourth grades — thought little of the news, partly because the email told parents of students at the school west of Madison that it was “highly unlikely” that the water was unsafe to drink.
But one faucet at West Middleton had more than six times the federal action level of 15 parts per billion of lead and nearly 19 times the federal action level of 1,300 ppb of copper. Other faucets showed a presence of lead.
Any amount of lead can cause permanent brain damage, including reduced intelligence and behavioral problems, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Infants and children are considered the most vulnerable to lead’s negative effects.
Fresh evidence of the risk of lead poisoning at school surfaced recently when Milwaukee Public Schools revealed that testing found dangerous levels of lead in 183 drinking water fountains, including at locations hosting early childhood programs. The months-long testing program involved more than 3,000 water fountains at 191 school district buildings. The district said it had shut down and plans to replace the fountains that tested at or above the federal action level of 15 ppb, even though “federal and state regulations do not require schools to test drinking water.”
The district did not respond to repeated questions since mid-November from the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism about whether water at the schools was being tested for lead, and calls and an email to district spokespeople were not immediately returned. The testing began in June.
“We care very much about the tens of thousands of kids who attend the Milwaukee Public Schools, and want to make sure that their water is safe,” Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett said.
He applauded MPS for working with the Milwaukee Health Department to conduct the tests, and he stressed that there are no lead service lines providing water to Milwaukee’s public schools.
“So, if you have no lead service lines coming into the building, and you’re still seeing some elevated lead water levels — al--
beit for less than 5% of the fixtures — where’s it coming from?” Barrett said. “And the answer — I believe, and we believe — is it’s coming from the plumbing that is within the building. Many of these buildings are older buildings. Which points to another issue that we as the public have to face for older homes.”
Efforts to protect Wisconsin children in schools and day care centers from lead in their water have fallen short on several fronts, the center has found. Among the problems uncovered by the center in documents and interviews:
There is a lack of testing for lead in drinking water consumed by children while away from home. Federal regulations enforced by the State of Wisconsin do not require most schools or day care centers to test at all. A USA TODAY investigation this year found that an estimated 90% of schools nationally are not required to test their water.
There has been confusion over proper lead testing procedures at some schools, day care centers and public water systems in Wisconsin, as the center has reported. This year, the state Department of Natural Resources waited nine months to send an official notice to public water system operators that the EPA had updated its testing recommendations in response to flaws uncovered by the leadin-water crisis in Flint, Mich.
Lead service lines, a significant source of lead in drinking water, continue to provide water to hundreds of schools and day care centers around Wisconsin. In other communities, officials are not sure how many schools and day cares have lead pipes.
Because of West Middleton’s rural Dane County location, the school has its own well and is among the minority of schools that must comply with some of the same testing requirements as municipal water systems. Lead generally makes its way into water not at the water plant but as it travels through service lines and indoor plumbing, all of which could contain lead.
Middleton-Cross Plains Area School District Superintendent George Mavroulis said after learning of the testing results, the school immediately shut off drinking water and consulted with a private testing company and a liaison from the DNR.
Two weeks after the initial test, the K-4 school with 400 students had the same faucets — and three water fountains — tested again. The levels of lead and copper returned to below the action level, and students and staff were again allowed to use the water.
“We tried to do everything in our power to make sure everyone was safe,” Mavroulis said.
The EPA issued new nationwide guidance in February clarifying that public water systems should not remove aerators or flush systems before sampling to avoid masking the level of lead in the water. DNR spokesman Jim Dick said West Middleton was in a “unique situation” because of its failure to previously flush the school’s system after the water had been stagnant for an extended period of time.
Going forward, however, the district will need to conduct two rounds of testing in the next year to assure the water is safe — and follow all of the appropriate sampling methods, he said.
After reviewing West Middleton’s test results, Yanna Lambrinidou, a Virginia Tech University researcher who helped train Flint researchers, said telling parents a health risk was highly unlikely was “a stunningly irresponsible statement, especially after Flint.”
Said Lambrinidou: “There is no safe level of lead in drinking water.”
All licensed day care centers in Wisconsin are required to identify and mitigate dangers from lead paint, but only centers that use private wells are required to eliminate lead hazards in drinking water, according to Joe Scialfa, spokesman for the state Department of Children and Families.
The USA TODAY investigation found that among schools and day care centers that are required to test, Wisconsin recorded the fourth-highest number of lead exceedances, with 24 between 2012 and 2015.
Lead in small doses dangerous
Exposure to even small amounts of lead can cause permanent damage. A 2012 study of nearly 4,000 fourth-graders in Milwaukee showed that those with elevated levels of lead — even below what is considered dangerous — scored significantly lower on reading and math tests than those without elevated blood-lead levels.
The Center for Investigative Journalism reported in February that at least 176,000 homes and businesses in Wisconsin receive water from lead service lines, which can account for 50% to 75% of lead contamination in tap water.
Milwaukee plans to focus $2.6 million from a new $14.5 million DNR program to begin replacing lead service lines leading to 384 licensed day care centers and 12 private schools in the city. In the meantime, the Milwaukee Health Department has advised those centers to reduce lead exposure by flushing water before using it and consider using only filtered or bottled water for preparing formula.
An additional 17 Wisconsin communities ranging from Antigo to Waterloo plan to use money from the program to replace lead service lines leading to their schools and day care centers.
School officials in Detroit, Chicago, Washington, D.C., and Massachusetts also have found high lead levels in the drinking water at hundreds of schools.
And day care centers — where infants could be fed baby formula made with tap water or toddlers could eat food cooked in lead-laden water — are of particular concern.
State Rep. LaTonya Johnson, a Democrat from Milwaukee, operated a day care business out of her 90-year-old home for several years before running for public office. She recently spent $10,000 to replace corroded pipes throughout her northwest side house, which is served by lead service lines.
Johnson said she used a cooler to provide water to children in her care, but not every day care provider does.
“I’m sure people use sink water,” she said. “It’s right there.”