Elburn beginning process to replace lead water service lines throughout village

Elburn needs to replace all lead water service pipes, but before it can take the necessary steps to do so, it will need to find them among the village’s homes and businesses.

Julie Morrison, senior project manager/principal for Engineering Enterprises, Inc., shared a lengthy presentation during the village of Elburn’s Committee of the Whole meeting on Jan. 18 regarding the Lead Service Line Replacement and Notification Act and what it means to the village.

The law mandates full lead service line replacement for all water systems within a required timeframe, which is based on the number of lead service lines in Elburn’s systems. Furthermore, it bans partial lead service line replacement so removing only the section of the line from the water main to the property line is prohibited.

This act, which became effective on Jan. 1, 2022, establishes timelines and requirements for the removal and replacement of all lead service lines in Illinois with the goal of protecting public health by addressing the estimated 680,000 lead-based service lines of in Illinois.

Morrison emphasized that other communities are in a similar situation as she recently shared her first presentation like this one to Carpentersville.

“You are not alone,” Morrison explained. “People don’t know what they have. Very few people know exactly what’s in their system.”

Inventorying is one of the initial challenges of this endeavor and the village will be communicating with residents via social media and correspondence accompanying water bills to begin moving forward.

“You have to do the inventory at some point because you are certifying to the state every year your service line and materials, and you have to by 2024,” she said. “You’re basically certifying exactly what you know. One of the streamline ways of doing this is getting the residents to help us, or hire us to knock on doors, but that’s not very efficient.”

Elburn is required to submit an initial service line materials inventory to the state by April 15, 2023 and a final complete inventory on the same date in 2024. In addition, water systems must submit an initial lead service line replacement plan to the state by April 15, 2024. It has to be updated every April 15 by review by the state until a final comprehensive plan is submitted no later than April 15, 2027.

“The big thing with the new changes is that once you identify lead services in your system, your sampling sites have to be at those lead sites,” Morrison said. “So if you have 20 lead services in your system, you’re required by the state to have 18 sampling sites and all 18 of those have to be where you have identified a lead service.”

Morrison went on to explain that the collection method has been modified as well.

“You used to be able to turn on the tap, and these are done in people’s homes, and turn on the faucet and take samples,” she said. “It used to be you’d take the first liter and test it and now it requires you to take the fifth liter so it means you measure up the first four liters, dump them and the fifth is tested.”

According to the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency, Elburn last reported 23 unknown material lines and a single lead line in 2020, but Morrison sounded skeptical that such data is correct.

When asked where that data came from, Morrison said she didn’t know, while Phil VanBogaert, superintendent of public works, didn’t know either; hence, driving the need for a thorough, accurate inventory of the entire village.