Update (April 12):
The drinking fixtures turned on at Creston have been temporarily turned off PPS said on Thursday.
Here's the letter sent to Creston school families and staff:
The drinking fixtures in the common areas at Creston K-8 that were turned back on Tuesday morning, April 10th, have been turned back off temporarily as an extra safety precaution.
PPS discovered Wednesday afternoon that the contractor had not followed established protocol and turned the faucets back on prior to receiving new test results.
It is important to note that these Creston drinking fixtures were replaced with new equipment and that none of these drinking faucets had previously exceeded the action levels for lead and copper back in 2016.
Based on previous testing data, there is a high likelihood that these drinking fixtures were below the action levels established by PPS. The fixtures that did test high for lead at Creston in 2016 were in-classroom drinking faucets, bathroom faucets and outdoor spigots, none of which were turned back on for drinking purposes. In addition, those fixtures had signs placed on them warning students and staff that they are not safe to drink from.
Test results for the drinking fixtures should be available next week. If the test results are below the PPS action levels for lead and copper as we expect they will be, then the water will be turned back on. Test results will be posted on the Healthy and Safe Schools/Water Quality web site: https://www.pps.net/Page/5378
Original story on April 11
There’s something to celebrate this year for kids and parents in the Portland Public Schools.
The water is slowly being turned back on at schools after a big lead scare about two years ago.
So far, water has been turned on and fixtures replaced at 28 of the 90 schools in the district. This week, 13 schools, including Creston, will have new fixtures installed and the water turned back on. Schools have been split up into six groups of 15. The first group had the water turned on in December. Creston is part of the second group. Work on the third and fourth group has already begun.
“We're happy, relieved, and ready to move forward,” said Lisa Kensel, who has three kids who attend Creston School.
For kids at Creston, it’s been about two years since they’ve been able to safely drink from the water fountains.
“I was like finally! Because I have been waiting forever for them to have water fountains,” said Juniper Zunin, a fourth-grader at the school.
“I feel safer that there’s no more lead in some of the water,” said Maddy Aman Glase, who is in second grade.
Kensel said she’s excited that the water problem is finally getting fixed.
She said it all started at Creston back in January 2016 when the parent-teacher association discovered lead testing hadn't been done for more than a decade.
“We were concerned in the beginning that district-wide it was an issue,” said Kensel.
In May of that year, water across the district was shut off due to high lead levels.
“They said you might get sick if you drink out of it,” recalled 11-year-old Jayla Carter.
But at the start of this school year, the huge project got underway. Dave Northfield with Portland Public Schools said he’s aware that it’s been nearly two years since the lead problem surfaced, but the district knew from the beginning it would be a long road.
“It was always known to the district that it would take a while for the momentum to build, the crews going in and getting up to speed and it would go more quickly as the work unfolded,” said Northfield.
So far, Northfield said replacing fixtures alone have lowered lead levels to an acceptable range. That means contractors haven’t had to go into the walls and replace pipes.
Up until this point, kids have had to drink from water bottles or a cooler. Northfield said that will probably cost the district more than $1 million.
He said money from the recent school bond that passed in May is helping fund the fixes. About $28.5 million was allocated to address lead in the water.
The hope is that fixtures will be replaced, and the water turned on at all schools by the end of summer.
Right now crews are doing their work at night and on weekends when kids aren’t at school.