Residents taking precautions against polluted drinking water
TUCSON — With some of their town’s wells still not clear of pollution, some residents of Marana are installing water-treatment systems and buying bottled water as alternatives.
Town residents are taking action in response to a half-dozen polluted wells serving more than onethird of the town water utility’s households, the Arizona Daily Star reported earlier this month.
Marana is located north of Tucson.
Higher than recommended levels of chemical pollutants were found in the wells in late 2016. Two pollutants found in the wells are known to cause a wide range of health effects.
The Marana Water Department has not said exactly when the wells will be cleaned up, town officials said.
The water utility has a detailed cleanup plan in place, but it requires federal direction as to how thoroughly the water needs to be cleaned since standards are frequently changing.
The utility estimates cleanup efforts will cost about $15 million.
The polluted wells provide water to nearly 2,800 customers. The Arizona Daily Star interviewed 11 affected homeowners, who told the paper that they don’t drink or cook with tap water without some form of treatment. They are aware their filters and other water-treatment methods can’t get rid of all the contaminants, some said.
Julian Hernandez and his wife Tiffany moved into one of the homes that receives contaminated water about five months ago.
They had no idea pollutants were in the water, they said.
“It’s definitely alarming. When we bought our house, it was a long-term investment,” Hernandez said.
Their home came with a reverse-osmosis filtering system for the water preinstalled, he said.
If they had known about the contaminated water sooner, they don’t think they would have moved into the home.