As a precaution, Munroe Falls will test all its water pipes for lead

Every water pipe in Munroe Falls will be mapped over the next year as part of a city-wide plan to find and replace any lead pipes still in use.

Munroe Falls Service Director Jim Bowery told council members at their Tuesday meeting it will be the first fully comprehensive survey ever done and will include private water lines connecting people’s homes to the network.

“We have until 2024 to do an inventory of all the service lines, from the water mains into residential homes, and identify them all to see if there are any lead ones,” he said. “We have until October that year to replace any lead pipes, and anything unknown is considered to be lead.”

The city has maps for major service lines, but the task is a big one, with 1,900 connections to homes and businesses in Munroe Falls. The finished inventory is required by the Environmental Protection Agency.

“Our water system was mainly installed in the 1950s, which is not very old,” Bowery said. “The new maps will allow the city engineers to dig down accurately and replace lead pipes if any are found. I have been with the city for 42 years and never come across one, but it does not mean there are none out there.

“We are pretty confident we do not have lead pipes. A few years back, we did a complete replacement of water meters and didn’t find any lead going into houses, but we have to document that for the EPA. The way to do that is to go door-to-door with field staff or do surveys or ask homeowners to take pictures.”

If the city can’t verify the presence of lead through these measures, then other steps such as water testing will be taken.

“We will use a machine to dig ‘potholes,’ which will let us see what materials have been used on both the city and residential sides,” Bowery said.

Lead was commonly used to make water pipes because it is easily shaped and does not rust, but medical research has shown there is no safe level of lead for human exposure. Lead poisoning builds up slowly in the human body over years and has been shown to lead to a wide range of problems, including developmental disabilities in children.

“The inventory is a requirement, and we’re going to comply and do whatever is necessary,” Council Member Ross Widenor said. “Sure, it can be annoying, especially when procedures change, but an annoyance is better than having lead in our water.”

The city undertakes lead testing every year in 20 properties — and no lead has been found in any of the samples. “We were only testing residential homes, but now we are obliged to test schools and daycare centers as well,” Bowery said.

If lead is found, the city has access to grant funding to help both the city and private residents meet the cost of replacing the pipes. “If lead is found in a private house, the owners will be obliged to replace pipes,” Bowery said.

Lead can also get into water supplies from older plumbing systems. “There was a period of time when plumbing fixtures and copper pipe solders contained lead but that was done away with years ago, though we still test for it,” he said.

Bowery said Munroe Falls has secured a $50,000 grant to help with the pipe inventory. As part of the project, the city will put together a questionnaire for all households and supply information on how to test your water supply for lead.

Up to now, water samples had been taken from taps that had just been turned on, known as a “first draw” test. But future tests will be done after the water has been running for a few minutes.

This is known as a “fifth draw” test and helps ensure the water being tested is straight from the city’s pipes rather than residential pipes.

“We are aiming to avoid a time bomb like the problems in Flint, Michigan,” said Bowery, referring to that city’s ongoing water crisis that began in 2014 and thus far has resulted in up to 12,000 children being exposed to lead.