This graphic demonstrates who is responsible for the water service for a home or apartment.
Reminder Publishing submitted photo
SOUTHWICK — After a ruling by the federal Environmental Protection Agency last October that every lead or copper water line in the country must be replaced in 12 years, the DPW is continuing its effort to verify the materials used in the water service lines of every home in town with a new initiative.
“We still have more data to collect,” DPW Director Randy Brown said about the data collection effort, coordinated by Tighe & Bond, to reach out to about 1,600 homeowners in town with door hangers to learn if their water service lines are lined with lead or contain copper.
The in-basement inspections will be conducted from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., between Jan. 22-24 and Feb. 3-4 by Tighe & Bond representatives.
Homeowners that got the door hanger can call 413-303-9962 to make an appointment or email southwicklsl@tighebond.com.
While Brown is confident that there are few, if any, lead-line water services in town, the EPA is requiring every municipality in the country to learn the materials used in water service lines for every home in their service areas.
“You have to know with 100% certainty,” Brown said.
When the DPW contracted with Tighe & Bond last year to collect the data, Brown said there were “a lot of unknowns” about the approximately 1,600 homes that haven’t been absolutely ruled out as not having lead-based water services.
“And if it’s unknown, according to the state, it’s assumed to be lead,” Brown said about those 1,600 homes.
And it’s not just the 1,600 homes being inventoried; he said there are some town-owned water lines in which the material used is unknown which must also be inspected.
Because it’s practically impossible to visually inspect the material used for water lines in those 1,600 homes, the state is allowing towns to create a computer model using the information it already knows about the material used in water services to homes in various areas throughout town.
Using that information, the computer model will extrapolate the data to determine with 95% certainty how many homes in the data set might have led-lined water lines, Brown said.
But the computer model needs more data to reach that certainty, Brown said.
To get the additional information, Brown said the Tighe & Bond representatives conducting the inventory need to visually inspect water-service lines in 180 homes and residences.
“We need to inspect 180 services,” Brown said.
Brown said there are two ways to inspect a water service line.
There is the in-basement check of the line by Tighe & Bond or performing a vacuum excavation outside the home where the line comes in from the street.
Vacuum excavation is a digging method using a vacuum to remove soil from a small diameter hole to visually inspect the line.
Homeowners can also perform a self-inspection, Brown said.
On the door hangers is a QR code that goes to a link that walks a homeowner through the process of inspecting the water service. To complete the self-inspection, at least three photos of the water line are needed and must uploaded to that link.
Last year, the state’s Department of Environmental Protection, following guidelines established by the federal Environmental Protection Agency, issued regulations requiring all municipal water systems with fewer than 10,000 connections to gather information about lead service lines and make it available to the public in a digital format.
To accomplish the inventory, the DEP awarded the town at grant of $216,300 from the state’s Clean Water Trust Board of Trustees.
To fund the effort, the EPA announced on Oct. 9 that the state had been awarded $53 million in grant using money from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to also address PFAS and other contaminants in municipal water systems across the state, according to the governor’s office.
While homeowners are responsible for replacing their water service lines, Brown said there are state grants available for homeowners to help cover part or all of the expense.
