The Village of Garden City has compiled, to the extent possible, an inventory of all lead water pipes in the community. Reports of the findings and owners’ notes were recently released at an Environmental Advisory Board (EAB) meeting.

Service lines are the pipes that connect village water pipes to homes and are considered the responsibility of the owners.

Water and Sewer Superintendent Stanley Carey joined the village EAB at its meeting on Wednesday evening, October 23. A week earlier, on October 16, municipalities like Garden City submitted their lead pipe inventories to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Garden City currently has 6,916 water lines in its distribution system. The Department of Water reports that a total of 3,136 service pipes were identified/classified and of these, 1,237 were lead. The total number of galvanized service lines requiring replacement was 39. The total of lead-free service lines – copper lines – in the inventory was 1,860. The use of copper lines is acceptable.

“The real wild card here is the unknown total number of water mains in the village, which is 3,824. EPA regulations state that we, as a municipality, must consider all those at the top , although I don’t think that’s the case. Until we can prove otherwise, the village needs to do more outreach or hear from residents until we can prove, through inspection or sampling, what these lines are made of,” said Superintendent Carey.

Carey last spoke to the EAB in May, emphasizing the importance of educating the public about the primary reports. Homeowners were asked to self-report, and the Water Department continues to link those reports to inspection data.

The Village of Garden City continued to offer free lead testing for homes, but the limit is one free test per property. According to Carey, some owners have submitted requests for follow-up testing.

“If you didn’t detect, that won’t change if you sample the water again, so we kept one test per house,” he noted.

The village also waived road opening permit application fees for work involving the removal and replacement of lead service lines.

In her Mayor’s column on Friday, October 18, Garden City Mayor Mary Carter Flanagan wrote, “The Water Department has created an inventory of all village water pipe materials, as asked the Ministry of Health. Residents and businesses were asked to complete a quick survey, which provided information on where to identify your material and material type information. Additionally, Water Department staff conducted home inspections for lead service lines for six weeks. Thank you to all residents who responded to our request for help with lead service line inventory.

Resident participation remains necessary

Carey highlighted the effectiveness of an online portal allowing residents to submit photos of their water lines. The Water Department also reviewed historical records and building permits to determine pipe materials based on the age of the building and renovations.

Field inspections included visits to residents’ homes to check pipe materials. Although no excavations took place, analyzes of water samples were extensively carried out.

Carey said the computer modeling also predicted the types of service lines for various homes. “If we had a few concentrated streets or a neighborhood that had lead and all the houses were built in the same time frame, we would look for building permits to clarify whether or not they had done renovations or improvements that would have involved permits – so we would assume those homes also had lead service lines,” he said.

Although the village met the EPA deadline, Carey noted that the Water Department would update the inventory as new data is received.

Carey clarified that lead contamination in Garden City does not come from the aquifer or village-owned water mains, but rather from service lines or older materials inside homes. He advised residents to use a strong magnet to test the pipes: a magnet will not stick to lead pipes but will cling to galvanized pipes. Copper pipes, he says, look like an American penny.

Looking to the future: more awareness

Federal regulations require all lead water pipes to be replaced within 10 years, starting in 2027. However, Garden City only owns local street water mains, not pipes individual water pipes connected to houses. This limits the village’s eligibility for grants to replace these private lines.

If Garden City, as the water supplier, owned all the lead or galvanized service lines found in the municipality, it would have until 2037 to replace them all.

Garden City will continue to notify residents with lead or galvanized pipes of replacement requirements.

“The federal government has allocated $2.6 billion for this project. program and the village continues to apply for a grant, although we have not been lucky enough to obtain one to date. Administrator Tai and I held meetings with many elected officials in the area, including state and federal officials, as we tried to make our case and relay the situation we find ourselves in. find here – and many grants are usually awarded later in the course. year, by December 31. We have clearly presented this to every elected official we have met with and I continue to stay in contact with the EPA. In fact, I’m expecting a response from them this month… Fingers crossed we get something by then,” Carey said.

By mid-November, homeowners suspected of having lead or galvanized pipes will receive a letter from the Department of Water “to inform them of our findings and their situation, which may be classified as ‘unknown.’

The Village has just completed mandatory notifications to residents whose homes exceeded lead standards for biannual water sampling. Over the past month, the Water Department has sent letters to homeowners with information about this in September. Carey said he has personally answered about 200 phone calls from residents.

“In a few weeks the same people will receive letters again and I am sure this will generate many new calls. If we continue to reduce this and maintain public awareness for lead and galvanizing line inventory, that’s all we can do for now until we hear about a grant or that the village council determine a program which would be what we legally do to help. replacing lines,” he explained.