Grosse Pointe City to test random sampling of water service lines for lead

GROSSE POINTE CITY — In keeping with a state mandate regarding lead water lines, Grosse Pointe City has hired a contractor to inspect and determine the nature of water service material inside select homes and buildings.

Using a computer program, a random sampling of City properties whose water line materials are unknown will be chosen for this investigation. Officials said that work will be done with permission from the homeowner.

City Manager Peter Dame said that, with other, similar testing programs, “We’ve not had anyone turn us down. … And frankly, the law says they can’t refuse us.”

Still, City officials plan to work with property owners to accomplish this testing.

Public Service Director Peter Randazzo said that, in 2018, the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy changed its lead and copper rules to mandate that all communities replace their lead and galvanized water service components to “at least 18 inches inside the building being served.”

The revised lead and copper rules also require “the creation of an inventory that identifies the materials of all service lines in the distribution system” and establishes new water sampling methods and requirements, Randazzo said.

“Based on the guidance from EGLE, that means 327 City water services must be physically verified using a uniform sampling procedure,” Randazzo said. “EGLE has established a four-point physical verification process which must be performed at each address.”

Those four steps include testing somewhere that’s at least 18 inches inside the building being served, 18 inches from the curb stop box toward the building being served, 18 inches from the curb stop box toward the water main, and, if necessary, at the water main connection if galvanized services are found at the curb stop box, according to the City’s engineers with Anderson, Eckstein & Westrick Inc.

As part of the amended lead and copper rules, all municipalities must develop a complete distribution system materials inventory of their water services and submit that to EGLE by Jan. 1, 2025, according to the City’s engineers.

“For communities (like Grosse Pointe City) with more than 1,500 water services of unknown material, the uniformly random sampling must physically verify enough lines to reach a 95% confidence level,” engineer Stephen Pangori, of AEW, wrote in a Sept. 12 memo to Randazzo.

At a meeting Sept. 19, the Grosse Pointe City Council voted unanimously in favor of a low bid from Underground Infrastructure Services to perform this investigation for $249,925. UIS was one of two firms that submitted bids for this job.

Randazzo said AEW has worked with UIS in other cities and “found them to be qualified for this type of work.”

Funds for this project were set aside in the Water Capital Projects Fund, officials said.

By Dec. 31, 2041, the City is required to replace all its lead and galvanized water lines.

“This is just an investigation towards the inventory,” Randazzo said.

He said the lead service lines that will be investigated in the sample aren’t being replaced yet.

Starting in 2020, the City was required by EGLE to replace 5% of its known lead and galvanized water lines.

Dame said the testing would “give us a higher number of (recorded) lead lines” and therefore improve the City’s chances for obtaining grants to remedy this.

“We have to test every home eventually over the next 20 years,” Dame said. “It’s a state requirement.”