DEQ tests confirm drinking fountain is the source of lead found at Ucon Elementary

School District 93 officials say tests performed by the Department of Environmental Quality show it was the make and model of the drinking fountain causing the traces of lead found in the water.

The safety director for the district John Pymm said all the other tests “indicate there’s no problem anywhere else in the building.”

Pymm said he was told a different water fountain at Ucon Elementary tested positive for lead three years ago. That fountain was not removed at the time. This round of testing, that fountain did not test positive for lead. However, that drinking fountain is the same make and model of the one that tested positive for lead last week. Pymm said both water fountains have been removed.

“The drinking fountain was built in 1987, during that time there were not the government restrictions on lead solder that there are now, and that seems to be what was causing the problem,” Pymm said. “We just felt like, even though the other one did not test positive, that we would remove both of them.”

Pymm said all of the other drinking fountains in the school are newer models and have been constructed using new guidelines.

“My maintenance director told me the district made a pretty significant effort to remove all of those particular drinking fountains sometime ago from the district, he’s not quite sure how this one got over looked, but with us becoming aware of the problem, we wanted to get it out as quickly as possible,” he said.

Pymm said he asked district plumbers and maintenance to “conduct a through examination of all the other fountains in the district.” If any are found they will be removed.