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Maine sets a health protective standard for lead in school drinking water

Augusta, Maine – This week Governor Janet Mills signed into law LD 206 which will require schools in Maine to test the drinking water they provide to students for lead and establish meaningful protections based on sound science. This aligns Maine with other northeastern states and is a significant improvement over the lax policies in place from the US EPA, taking a critical step towards protecting children across the state from this toxic chemical. 

The tragedy of Flint, Michigan painfully demonstrated the dangers of lead entering drinking water. A potent neurotoxin, lead robs children of their potential by lowering their IQ scores and causing learning and behavioral problems. Unfortunately, older plumbing and fixtures can leach lead into the water, so testing water at the tap is the only way to know if water is contaminated. Nationally, older school buildings, have been found to frequently have high levels of lead in water. In Maine, contaminated school water has made headlines in Boothbay, Machias, Lewiston, and Yarmouth, amongst other places. 

“Lead is a potent neurotoxin, robbing children of their potential by irreversibly damaging their brain and lowering their IQ,” said Patrick MacRoy, Deputy Director at Defend Our Health. “This law will help protect children in a way that is both common sense and affordable. Once lead-containing taps are identified, most schools have no or low-cost options for providing safe water, like turning off the bad taps or installing filters.”

LD 206, “Resolve, Regarding Legislative Review of Portions of Chapter 234,” requires the Department of Health and Human Services to modify a proposed rule for lead in school water to adhere to what pediatricians and health scientists say are safer levels thus matching the levels in neighboring states like Vermont, and similar to levels in other jurisdictions including Illinois, Massachusetts, and the District of Columbia. While legislators on the committee disagreed on some of the details, there was unanimous bipartisan agreement that standards applied to schools needed to be more health protective than the outdated USEPA standard for water utilities. The legislature ultimately adopted, and the governor signed, the most health protective majority amendment to the legislation. 

“We would like to thank the co-chairs of the Health and Human Services Committee, Rep. Michele Meyer and Sen. Ned Claxton, for their leadership in crafting a truly health protective bill,” said Sarah Woodbury, Director of Advocacy at Defend Our Health. “The bill would also not have been possible without the leadership of Rep. Rebecca Millett who introduced the original requirement to test schools in 2019, as well as the support of children’s health and labor advocates who shared their testimony to ensure our schools are safe.” 

Background: 

In 2019, the Maine Legislature passed a bill sponsored by then Senator Rebecca Millett that required the Maine Center for Disease Control & Prevention to provide lead in water testing to all schools in the state, and requiring the agency to present a proposed rule on how to do this to the legislature. LD 206 amends the Maine CDC’s proposed rules, which had held schools to the same outdated and troubled federal standard of 15 parts-per-billion (ppb) of lead used for water utilities. In addition to the need to protect children, schools have many low-cost options, like disconnecting problematic taps, to address problems that are not readily available to utilities. The Department will now have to set a level of 4 ppb as a threshold for action. It also requires testing to be conducted in ways that actually mimic how children use water, rather than an unrealistic way that artificially reduces levels as originally proposed.

In 2019, the Vermont legislature set the state’s action level for school drinking water at 4 ppb and Massachusetts set a level of 1 ppb. In 2018, the District of Columbia set the level at 5ppb for triggering action in their schools. In 2017, the Illinois legislature required comprehensive school testing with “prompt” notification to parents of all levels in excess of 5ppb.