Good morning Mr. Hollins:
Emergency Manager Ambrose asked me to send the attached information.
Thank you.
Maxine Murray
Executive Assistant to
Mayor Dayne Walling
Gerald Ambrose, Emergency Manager
1101 S. Saginaw Street
Flint, MI 48502
810.237.2035 Telephone
810.766.7218 Fax
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ABC12 Investigates: What's In your water?
Posted: Jan 29, 2015 3:38 PM EST
Updated: Jan 29, 2015 11:54 PM EST
By Larry Eliott CONNECT
FLINT (WJRT) - (01/29/15) - The results are in and we now have a completely independent look at what's in
Flint's water supply.
For months, since Flint switched from a Detroit water supply to the Flint River as it's water source, Flint water
customers have complained of smelly, cloudy, bad tasting water and blame it for a variety of health
problems.
Complaints exploded earlier this month when Flint notified its water customers that a group of chemicals
known as TTHM were at much higher average levels than allowed by law.
With so many questions and distrust of the answers, ABC 12's Larry Elliott investigates - What's in your
Water?
ltseems no matter who you ask in the Flint area, there's an opinion about the city’s water. Most of the issues
center on the quality of the water and whether it's safe to drink.
“Right now it smells," said Flint resident Lee Miller. “We're getting water out of our own back yard now and ifs
costing me double what it was coming from Detroit.”
“Ithas a funny taste to it," said Flint resident Milton Alexander.
"it could be dangerous to us, actually | don't know how dangerous itis," said Flint resident Sharika Sanders.
“Im no cheerleader for the water department here, | think we've gat a lot of issues to work on.” Ken
VanWagoner, of Good Beans Cafe - Flint.
Most of the issues center on the quality of the water and whether it’s safa to drink, but concem over its safety
reached a new high earlier this month when the city was required by the state Department of Environmental
Quality to notify residents that the water had exceeded the allowable limit of a group of chemicals known as
TTHM.
TTHM ts in most municipal water systems and is thought by some to be a possible carcinogen in long term
exposure.
It's a byproduct of chlorination, which is commonly used to help purify water. Last August, as Flints water
treatment plant worked to purify the water it was drawing from the Flint River, levels of TTHM grew to well
over the EPA allowed maximum,
August test results provided by the DEQ to ABC 12 show all of the eight testing sites around Flint had TTHM
levels well above the legal limit.
The lowest level among the eight sites was 40 percent above the lagal ltmit. The highest was 145 percent
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more than allowed.
DEQ rules only require the city to report higher than allowed levels to the public once a year, and only ifthe
average of quarteriy tests Is higher than the legal IImit.
That notification went out te residents on Jan. 5. Since then, many residents have refused to believe
assurances from the DEQ and the city that the water is now safe to drink.
So, we set out to do complete and independent testing to find out for ourselves exactly what's In your water.
It took a bit of research, but we finally found Water Tech, in Howell, a testing lab with absolutely no tles to
Flint, just to make sure there are no questions about the test results.
Aftar having Water Tech train ABC 12's Larry Elllotton the proper methods for collecting water samptes, we
set outlast week to randomly test five sites in Flint.
1. Downtown.
“I'm excited to see this done because this Is an Independent way to find out that everything's just fine,”
VanWagoner said,
2. The north side,
"We'd like to do kind of a whole battery of tests of your water. Oh yeah,” Alexander said.
3. The west side.
“It could be dangerous to us, How about if we help you find out what's In It right new?" Sanders said.
4. The east side.
*I'm hoping for a good test and put my family at ease,” Miller said.
5. Our main studio, on the south side.
We also wanted to compare whatever we're to find with Detrcit supplied water, so we took a sampie from the
Burton water system.
Since next year Filnt will connect to the new KWA pipeline, getting its water from Lake Huron, we took a
comparison sample from the Saginaw-Midland water system, which currently uses Lake Huron water.
We tested all the sites for levels of TTHM. We also tested how much residual chlorine was in the Flint and
Burton water supply and more Importantly, we tested at two of our Flint sites for a number of other hazardous
chemicals that could cause skin or other health problems,
Tests for those other chemicals are not required for public water systems, but we decided to run those tests
anyway,
Here's what our independent testing shows:
All sites tested, including the Saginaw-Midland water system and the Burton system, using Detroit water,
contalned TTHM - but all of them were well below the EPA allowed maximum.
Saginaw-Midland water had less than a third of the maximum TTHM allowed, the Burton system had only
about 25 percent of the maximum and the highest level found of all of our Flint tests showed just over 65
percent of what's allowed, all below EPA limits.
A similar byproduct of chlorination, haloacetic acids, was also well below EPA maximums in Flint’s water,
We tested Flints north and east water samples for many other hazardous chemicals that a doctor told us
could cause skin or other health problems, and on both tests, not a single one of those chemicals was
detected,
Since most often any smell to the water would be caused by levels of total residual chlorine, we tested that
too, in both our Flint and Burton samples,
The legal limit is 4 milligrams per liter. The average of our Flint samples shows a level of about a half
milligram per liter, Our testin Burton actually shows 22 percent more residual chlorine than Flint.
Our Flint sample also showed no Collform bacteria.
We asked Chris McCarthy, of Water Tech, a few questions.
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Q: How would you describe these test results?
A: "Well, for the samples received, the tests we performed, everything Is within EPA guidelines for safe
drinking water.”
Q: Is there anything in these results that raises a red flag for you?
A: "For water quality or water safety, No.*
We then asked residents if these results change thelr opinion of what they'l do with their water now.
*To be honest, no," Alexander said.
*it will make me feel a lot more comfortable abaut bathing and brushing my teeth in it, but rm still not going to
drink itand I'm not gonna give it to my kids or my dog,” Sanders said.
“it makes me feel a lot more safer, a lot more comfortable knowing that It's safe to drink now, you know. Il tell
you a load lifted off my shoulders. When the kids take baths, when my wife takes a shower, you know, | know
now we're safe,” Miller said.
So what about those who've stood before Flint City Council with jugs of discolored water?
While Geneseo County Drain Commissioner Jeff Wright points out he has no jurisdiction over Flint's water
system, he says in general, discolored water like this Is nearly always the result of water main breaks or
repairs, and Flint has more than its share because of its aging system.
Wright also says the KWA pipeline won't change that. It will take better management of repalrs and money -
lots of it- to replace Fiint's aging water mains,
Unfortunately for the city of Flint, those very high levels of TTHM recorded last August In Flint water tests are
still required by the DEQ to be included In the next report calculating average TTHM levels.
The next test will be done next week, and city Public Works Director Howard Croft tells ABC 12, because of
the high levels last August, the city will again be found in violation and will be required by the DEQ to send
out another TTHM notice of violation to all Flint water customers in early March, even if all new tests show
levels under the legal limit.
To view the TTHM testing results from the Michigan DEQ, click HERE.
To view the results of ABC12's water tests, click on the location you'd like to see results for below:
Flint Center.
Flint North,
FlintEast,
Flint South
Flint West
Burton,
w= Mii
To view the Michigan DEQ results for South Flint, click HERE.
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Lamphier, Wendy (Treasury)