State Audits Reveal Deficiencies in School Drinking Water Tests for Lead

Exposure to lead, a toxic metal, has a wide range of harmful effects toward people, from headaches and stomach pains to more severe conditions such as heart disease and impaired kidney function. Children are especially vulnerable, with exposure linked to brain damage, developmental delays, behavioral issues, and hearing and speech impairments. Therefore, it’s essential that lead levels are properly monitored through accurate testing and any exceedances are promptly addressed and reduced through effective remediation, or are properly secured against use and are consistently reported to all required parties for schools.

Drinking water is a pathway to lead exposure when it passes through plumbing or fixtures  containing lead. New York’s Lead Testing in School Drinking Water law, originally passed in 2016, and later revised in 2021, requires public schools to test for elevated levels of lead in drinking water and fix contaminated water sources.* To date there have been three testing periods:

  • First testing period: 2016
  • Second testing period: 2020-2021
  • Third testing period: 2023-2025 

Periodically, the Office of the New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli conducts audits of local governments and school districts to improve program performance and operations, reduce costs, and contribute to public accountability. So far this year, the Comptroller’s Office has released audits of the lead testing and reporting programs of twenty-one school districts generally covering the periods of July 1, 2019 – September 30, 2024:

Here are two key findings from the audits:

  1. Incomplete testing and remediation:  School districts did not properly test a large portion of drinking water outlets — such as water fountains and sinks — for lead. The audit noted that these school districts missed outlets largely because they lacked a thorough and organized plan.  Also, the school districts did not develop remediation plans to address the contaminated water outlets by replacing a fixture, installing a filter, shutting down an outlet, or posting a warning sign and providing a combination of instruction and supervision to secure the outlet from use. 
  2. Delayed or absent reporting: Lab results were reported late, not posted to the schools’ websites, and not shared with staff/parents/guardians.

Incomplete testing

The audits found a lack of planning, formality, and archival of documents which caused confusion in each of these districts — resulting in incomplete testing and a slow or absent response to lead contaminated water sources. All twenty-one school districts failed to test or properly exclude every water outlet that was identified. 

The percentages of outlets that were not tested or excluded are listed below:

  • Poland: 75%
  • Chazy: 65%
  • York: 58%
  • Oxford: 56%
  • Tupper Lake: 50%
  • Glen Cove: 48%
  • Indian Lake: 47%
  • Germantown: 43%
  • East Bloomfield: 39%
  • Cheektowaga-Maryvale: 37%
  • Wayland-Cohocton: 37%
  • Johnstown: 36%
  • Sullivan West: 33%
  • Moravia: 32%
  • Fredonia: 27%
  • DeRuyter: 21%
  • Ravena Coeymans Selkirk: 19%
  • Bayport: 12.5%
  • Harpursville: 12%
  • Commack: 3.8%
  • Pine Plains: 3.6% 

Comptroller Recommendations:

  • Each school district must test all potable outlets and moving forward they should also secure all outlets in rooms not intended for drinking or cooking which can be exempt from testing.
  • A sampling plan should be used to identify the rest of the water outlets that need to be sampled or exempted and then secure those to prevent someone from consuming water from the outlets. 

Inadequate Remediation

The state law sets the “action level” where any levels above this amount must be “remediated” (i.e., discontinued from service as a drinking source, filtered, or replaced) in order to reduce lead exposures. 

Nearly all schools lacked some aspect of remediation to inform or prevent students or staff from consuming water from affected outlets.

Comptroller Recommendations:

  • All twenty-one districts need a formal sampling plan, including clearly defining the roles and responsibilities of staff involved in the Lead Testing program. This should address staff turnover, confusion over individual roles in lead testing, informal reporting and record keeping. 
  • A formal remedial action plan should be established to maintain a detailed record of exemptions and the remediation actions taken on water outlets above the lead action level, including removing water outlets that exceed the action level from service until it is confirmed that they are below or secured against use. This plan should be periodically reviewed and updated as needed..

Delayed or absent reporting 

Another essential part of New York’s Lead Testing in School Drinking Water law is the transparency that comes along with it. If contaminated outlets are found, school districts are required to alert the local health department, notify parents, guardians, and staff, and report results to the NYSDOH through a system called the Health Electronic Response Data System (HERDS). Districts must also post the results and the plan for resolving contaminated outlets on the school’s website. 

Here’s a chart showing the number of school districts cited for delayed or absent reporting.

Below is a table indicating which school districts failed to meet the reporting requirements: (Note: Oxford addressed all of their reporting requirements so it was not included). 

School District Failed to notify the local health department within one business day of receiving results Did not properly report results through HERDS within 10 business days  Did not have documentation to demonstrate they sent written notification to staff, parents, or guardians within 10 business days  Missed the six-week deadline to post test results on its website 
Bayport X X X
Chazy X X X
Cheektowaga-Maryvale X X X X
Commack X X X
DeRuyter X X X X
East Bloomfield X X X X
Fredonia X X X X
Germantown X X X
Glen Cove X X X X
Harpursville X X X X
Indian Lake X X X X
Johnstown X X
Moravia X X X X
Pine Plains X X
Poland X X X X
Ravena Coeymans Selkirk X X
Sullivan West X X X
Tupper Lake X X X
Wayland-Cohocton X X X X
York X X X X
Totals  15 16 19 18

Comptroller Recommendations:

The Comptroller’s Office first recommended that each school district make sure to notify everyone who needs to be informed on time, including: the DOH, local health departments, parents/guardians, and the public through the website. From now on, these schools must also assign clear responsibilities to staff involved in result reporting to avoid delays or missed reports and keep detailed records of when and how information is shared with the public.

Through the audits, the Comptroller’s Office has demonstrated a strong commitment to protecting students and staff from the dangers of lead in drinking water by holding schools accountable to the requirements of the Lead Testing in School Drinking Water law. We look forward to reviewing their future audits.

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*NYLCV and its partners were strong proponents of this law. NYLCV continues to monitor the progress of this program with the help of dozens of volunteers including Ava Littman, Aadi Saxena, and Audrey Wong as well as NYLCV’s Fellow Raquel “Rocky” Mack who contributed to this blog post.