State sues company over lead found in water

UNIVERSITY PARK, Ill. — Illinois claims a company that provides water to a Chicago suburb made changes without permission from state regulators that caused lead to contaminate the village’s drinking water.

Attorney General Kwame Raoul filed a lawsuit Friday against Aqua Illinois, the company that supplies water to residents of University Park.

The lawsuit says Aqua Illinois switched the source of the village’s water from groundwater wells to the Kankakee River in 2017. It alleges a chemical added to the water system to address resident complaints about the taste removed a protective layer in residential plumbing, causing lead to leach into the water.

Raoul says the company didn’t obtain required permits from the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency before switching the water source, or before it added the blended phosphate mix to the water system. The company disputes the allegation that the violations caused the contamination.

Raoul says Aqua Illinois has warned residents not to drink the water and that the company also is providing impacted residents with bottled water and filters.

The company said it has been working along with the IEPA to correct the problems, and some violations already have been corrected.

More than 85% of the village’s nearly 7,000 residents are black, and Raoul noted serious damage has occurred in other predominantly minority communities where contaminated water wasn’t immediately addressed. In the majorityblack city of Flint, Mich., for example, the toxic metal leached into the supply in 2014 and 2015 due to a lack of corrosioncontrol treatment after a switch in the water source.