The city of Flint continues to be plagued with the issues surrounding its tainted water supply. City of Grand Rapids officials want to assure residents that what’s happening in Flint, won’t happen here.
“We have a high quality water coming through Lake Michigan, so that really cannot happen here in Grand Rapids.”
That’s Steve Guitar, Communications Director for the City for Grand Rapids, referring to how the water crisis in Flint won’t be an issue in this city. Corrosive water from the Flint River caused lead to leach from old plumbing resulting in high lead levels in many Flint homes. The Grand Rapids Water System recently sent out a news release to allay any fears residents might have considering all the news coming out of Flint.
“We’ve collected water and treated water the same way for 40 years, and what happened in Flint, they changed their water source and they didn’t use a phosphate to coat the pipes, so that corroded the pipes immediately, which caused the problem of what’s happening in Flint.”
Guitar says levels are continually monitored. In fact, lead levels in drinking water provided by the Grand Rapids Water System have consistently improved over the last 20 years. Lead test results stand at 2.2 parts per billion in the 90th percentile. That’s among the lowest in the state. Joellen Thompson is the Water System Manager.
“Because we are adding the phosphates which is coating the pipes, we are continually finding lower and lower lead levels. So we are at two parts per billion, which is really low. Considerable below the 15 parts per billion threshold.”
Thompson says if anyone is concerned about lead levels in their drinking water, the City will work with them in a lead abatement program, which could include replacing the city owned portion of the service line.
