This finding led local school districts to replace some water infrastructure. After the Flint, Mich. water crisis, the Ohio Facilities Construction Commission (OFCC) began a $12 million state grant program that reimburses Ohio schools for testing and replacing lead-affected plumbing fixtures in schools built before 1990.
This newspaper studied state data on school lead testing. Then requested original documents from more than 20 local schools and districts to see how local students were affected.
MORE: Local schools find lead in water; more plan to test
Here’s what you should know:
- Stephen Bell Elementary had 20 water sources test over the limit for lead, the highest number of any local school in the OFCC program. Sinks in one classroom and two teacher work rooms were still over the limit after replacement, so the district paid to add filtration devices.
- Seven fixtures tested too high across five Lakota elementary and early childhood schoolsin West Chester. All fixtures over the limit in Shawnee, Adena, Creekside, Freedom and Hopewell were replaced. One fixture at Freedom Elementary was 52 times higher than the federal limit, according to the testing documents. Another at Adena was 11 times the limit.
- At St. Charles Borromeo in Kettering, there were 19 water sources above the EPA "lead action level" and all were replaced.
- Four water sources at Northeastern High School in Clark County tested over the EPA limits, according to district documents. The school disabled those four fixtures and provided bottled water for students.
- The vast majority of local schools did not participate in the state-reimbursed testing. Some did not because they were built after 1990 and therefore ineligible. "There is no safe level of lead in a child's blood," said Tom Hut, who oversees the childhood lead poisoning prevention program for Public Health Dayton and Montgomery County. "Those systems should be tested."
- Middletown, Tipp City and Fairborn also tested and found no elevated lead levels, according to OFCC data.
- Some districts, including Oakwood, Mad River, Hamilton and Clark-Shawnee, did lead testing outside of the OFCC program.
