Kathryn Pilgrim knew the century-old Victorian she bought in Dunkirk, New York, came with old plumbing. She replaced pipes she suspected of containing lead and later installed a kitchen filter designed to remove heavy metals.
But six years after buying the house, she still can’t be sure that her tap water is lead-free because she doesn’t know what material was used for the pipe that runs under her front yard and connects to the city water supply. Dunkirk is nearly two years behind schedule on an inventory that would give Pilgrim and other residents that information.
Dunkirk, which supplies water to about 5,000 homes and businesses, is one of more than 1,300 public water systems cited by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for failing to meet an October 2024 deadline to hand in an inventory of the water lines that could be leaching the heavy metal into Americans’ drinking water, an Associated Press analysis of the agency’s enforcement data shows.
Roughly 6,300 water systems serving 3.8 million Americans have still not submitted a required list of how many lead service lines remain in use.
Those inventories are critical for cities to replace all lead pipes by an upcoming 10-year deadline. Failing to document the lines also means residents won’t know if their homes have a potential source of lead exposure.
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