In rural Ariz., water safety standards lag
Some say regulators let small systems off the hook too often
Whenever it rains, Gary Boileau expects the drinking water he tests to have too many nitrates — chemicals that can cause a potentially fatal blood disorder in infants.
Seven times over the past four years, Boileau was required to post a public notice informing users in the Sun Valley Farms Unit VI water system that nitrate levels in their drinking water had exceeded federal standards.
Farmers fertilize their crops with nitrogen. In agricultural parts of the state like the San Tan Valley area, where Sun Valley Farms is located, high levels of nitrates often seep into the aquifer, said Boileau, the system’s operator.
Every time the system goes over limits, the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality sends a letter notifying managers of the violation and giving them a schedule to fix the problem. But Sun Valley Farms has not faced any kind of formal enforcement in five years.
The regulatory agency goes out of its way to work with small, rural water systems, Boileau said. “They’re very lenient,” he said. “Which is fantastic.” He explains: If the state handed out fines and escalated punishment, it could be devastating to water companies with limited funds and poor infrastructure.
But water-quality advocates say ADEQ lets violators of rules on safe drinking water off the hook too often, especially in rural areas of the state.
Erik Olson, director of the Natural Resources Defense Council’s health program, said the failure of the federal Environmental Protection Agency and state agencies to formally notify systems that they need to improve their water quality allows some to get away with violations for too long.
“That’s a formula for people drinking bad water, sometimes for many years,” Olson said. “That enforcement policy is repeatedly being ignored.”
Records examined by The Arizona Republic suggest many systems that should have been subject to formal
enforcement have repeatedly avoided it.
Though the EPA cautions that its own data may be incomplete, an agency database shows 184 Arizona water systems have been violating federal rules for three consecutive years. Of those, 62 have had serious violations for nine consecutive months or more.
EPA policy recommends some kind of formal action by state regulators if a system does not return to compliance within six months. Yet advocates for safe drinking water say that policy is not enforced, and the agency’s database shows onequarter of those out of compliance have not had any formal enforcement on their record in the past five years.
New Mexico has a similar number of systems out of compliance. However, about 75 percent of the systems that deserved them had been issued formal corrective orders.
Formal actions, according to EPA policy, require a schedule for systems to get back into compliance, and spell out consequences if a system continues not to comply. Informal actions are less specific.
ADEQ believes the informal enforcement route is more effective, said Daniel Czecholinski, ADEQ’s drinking-water section manager.
He said there is a difference in philosophies between the state and federal agencies.
Czecholinski said his department concentrates on returning systems to compliance through informal enforcement, such as reminder letters and phone calls. The agency questions the benefits of formal orders.
For example, formal legal action could delay the process of getting systems back into compliance, Czecholinski said. And systems are more receptive to informal enforcement, he said.
And, he argued, relatively few cases require formal enforcement. Of 405 enforcement cases ADEQ closed in the past four years, fewer than 10 percent needed to be escalated to formal enforcement, Czecholinski said.
In a statement, an EPA press officer said the agency may “decide to provide compliance assistance to a non-complying entity, or determine that capacity development is needed before a formal enforcement action is likely to succeed.”
The EPA’s rules allow some flexibility for systems working to fix their problems reasonably quickly. But the rules also say informal enforcement is not “something that can be extended indefinitely as a way to avoid formal action.”
ADEQ records, meanwhile, show many systems that have received repeated informal enforcement from the state have not changed their behavior.
The EPA’s inspector general says more enforcement is needed
An EPA inspector general’s report said nine water systems in Arizona have had serious, uncorrected violations over the course of four years. Violations at six of the systems remain uncorrected.
One, Antelope Peak, which serves the south-central Arizona community of Stanfield, has repeatedly tested over federal limits for arsenic and uranium, both carcinogens. They have also exceeded regulations in nitrates and inorganic chemicals, according to EPA data.
Antelope Peak has been subject to formal enforcement twice in the past five years.
Compliance orders were issued in 2011 and 2015, to little effect. The system remains listed as a serious violator. It has not been penalized, and no lawsuits appear to have been filed against any of the nine systems.
Together, the nine systems have faced 232 informal enforcement actions.
The inspector general said in its report that the EPA should do more to make sure small water systems achieve compliance.
The report found that state regulatory bodies had failed to bring about compliance at 193 problematic systems nationwide.
Few systems ever received a formal enforcement order, and even fewer were delivered in a timely manner, the inspector general reported.
Without effective enforcement, the report noted, “human health risks may continue at these small community water systems.”
In a system that relies on selfreporting, a lack of accountability
In many rural areas, some ongoing violations have been left unresolved for years.
“Regulatory compliance is a little bit fast and loose in places like that,” said Paul Reside, a member of the Arizona Water Quality Association board of directors. “They can set forth rules and standards, but in terms of actually enforcing, the muscle is just not there.”
A system that relies on self-reporting is problematic, Reside said. By failing to hold water systems accountable, there is no guarantee of clean drinking water.
But rural systems face a lack of funding for infrastructure improvements. One national study estimated the U.S. needs at least $1 trillion in funding for water-system improvements over the next 25 years.
Consumers, meanwhile, aren’t aware of problems with their water and are reluctant to accept rate increases to make needed improvements.
If a company hasn’t filed for rate increase in a long time, consumers will often experience “rate shock,” said Angie Holdsworth, communications manager for the Arizona Corporation Commission. Some companies haven’t filed for decades, she said.
Grant funding is also an option. The Arizona Legislature approved a bill in its last session appropriating $500,000 in grants to help small water companies. The Corporation Commission decides which systems are awarded grants. But small systems often find funding is difficult to secure.
‘You can have people getting sick from the water and not ... know it’
Jeff York keeps a binder of his watersample results at the Mohawk Valley School District in Roll. Page after page and row after row of samples are recorded and dated by York, who works for the district. Yet EPA records show the system has received at least nine informal notices from ADEQ of missed testing deadlines over the past two years.
Managers at the school east of Yuma said they believe ADEQ misplaces their information. Staff now forwards email results back to the agency when they are lost. But the violation points — points accrue when violation notices are sent — remain unchanged.
Czecholinski conceded past problems with samples sent via fax. Systems now must submit by mail, email or in person. He said agency improvements are aimed at reducing the number of lost records.
The department processes 80,000 water samples annually, he said.
Neal Whittle, a certified water-plant operator with the Rural Water Association, said lost or misplaced records are a common complaint among small water systems.
The water system at White Mountain Lakes Estates recently resubmitted to ADEQ a year’s worth of coliform sample results because months of testing records were missing. The system also failed to submit annual consumer reports from 2009 to 2013, according to ADEQ records. The system has 60 informal actions — and no formal actions — on its EPA record.
Lemuel Cook, a point of contact for the White Mountain Lakes Estates water system, said there had been problems communicating with ADEQ.
Olson said those kinds of repeated failures — either to test water or report the results to state agencies — are a cause for concern.
“You can have people getting sick from the water and not even know it,” Olson said. “That makes you wonder how effective they are at making sure the water isn’t contaminated.”
A small school faces big infrastructure challenges
The canal water that flows to the Mohawk Valley School District’s plant sometimes has snails and moss in it. The school, which serves about 175 students, lacks the filter to fix the problem.
“It all gets into our little filters and our system is not designed for that,” York said. “It’s got to have something to settle it and separate it out.”
District Superintendent Shanna Johnson asked the Arizona School Facilities Board this spring for money to fix the problem. Engineering and design alone will cost $49,000. Funding has been approved, but it was a long road, Johnson said.
The design for a system rebuilt in 2003 was flawed, Johnson said. The School Facilities Board approved a $250,000 refurbishment just two years ago after ADEQ pointed to the plant’s decade-old deficiencies.
The agency also required special training for York, who wears several hats for the district, including one as bus driver.
York, whose grandchildren attend the school, said he takes personal responsibility for the district’s water quality and tries to keep up with ADEQ rules.
“I’m not going to have bad water,” he said. “Period.”