The city is continuing their effort to prepare for new federal regulations pertaining to lead levels in public drinking water that are set to go into effect October 2024.

The rules will lower the amount of detectable lead in the water that triggers treatment actions and data reporting, with the potential for significant cost to the City of Great Falls.

The new rules are from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and city officials said the revision for stricter compliance was triggered by the 2014 Flint, Mich. water crisis in which public water supplies were contaminated with lead.

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During their May 16 work session, Mark Juras of the public works department updated City Commissioners on the process.

The city has been developing a lead service line inventory.

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Under the new rules, the inventory will have to show what water service lines are not known as lead, those that are known as lead and those that are unknown.

The EPA assumes a service line is lead until it’s proven otherwise, Juras said.

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Juras told commissioners that when they started the process, they had about 10,000 potential unknown service lines that could have been lead.

The city used historical records to identify as many lines as possible and in July 2022, the city mailed letters asking residents to test their lines and send the information back to the city. The city mailed about 10,000 letters and received about 3,000 back.

He said city public works staff are attempting to contact the other property owners to identify their types of service lines.

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As of the May 16 work session, he said staff had made about 4,000 phones calls and identified another 1,000 service lines.

As of May 23, Juras said the following lines had been identified:

• Non-lead: 14,846
• Lead: 142
• Galvanized: 502
• Unknown: 6,423

Juras said they anticipate few lines to be lead as they identify service lines.

The city is responsible for the mains and service lines in the street, the property owner is responsible for the line to the property, according to the city.

The rule also changes testing and sampling requirements.

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The city is beginning early mandatory sampling in June with 30 lead line participants in the city limits. The results in July will identify if corrosion treatment is needed at the water plant, or if service line replacements are needed.

The federal infrastructure bill allocated $15 billion to implement the new lead and copper rules, Juras said.

He said the state is expected to receive about $140 million and those funds will be dispersed through a revolving loan fund to help with the cost of replacing service lines.

City prepping for new EPA rules on lead in public water systems [2022]

Juras said the city is developing a pilot program to replace 20 lead service lines, gain useful experience and develop a template for future projects.

Juras told commissioners they’re planning a follow-up work session on the rule in August.