Dear Marion Community:

In the spring of 2016, we made a decision to voluntarily and proactively have our district water sources tested for lead levels.  Through the Genesee Valley BOCES, we contracted with Leader Professional Services, Inc. to draw the samples and conduct the analyses.  131 total samples were drawn from the Junior-Senior High School and Elementary School.

We have now received the testing results from our two schools. We used the guidance document from the United States Environmental Protection Agency’s (USEPA), “3Ts for Reducing Lead in Drinking Water in Schools”  to evaluate our test results.  This guidance establishes an actionable level of 20 parts per billion (ppb) for lead in drinking water.

There are twenty water fountains in the district, as well as two ice machines.  None of the samples from these twenty-two fixtures were found to have lead levels reaching the actionable level of 20 ppb.  Since these are presumably the primary sources of drinking water for our students and staff, we were pleased with these results.

There were, however, eighteen samples from the elementary school and eleven samples from the high school that exceeded the actionable threshold of 20 ppb.  These were all sink faucets.  Although we wouldn’t consider a sink faucet as a typical source of drinking water, it is conceivable that someone could consume water taken from a sink faucet.  In response to this, we will label these fixtures as not to be used for drinking water.  We will then make an evaluation as to replacing some or all of these fixtures.  Any replaced fixture would then be retested.    

As always, our student and staff’s health and safety are our utmost concern.  If anyone has any further questions, you may contact me directly at 926-2300. 

Sincerely,

Donald R. Bavis

Superintendent of Schools