A basement sink in Saranac Lake shows its age, but these are not the pipes village of Saranac Lake officials are trying to locate with their upcoming survey. They are looking for lead laterals connecting homes to water mains. (Enterprise photo — Andy Flynn)

SARANAC LAKE — The village of Saranac Lake is conducting a water line survey to get an inventory of how many service lines connecting homes and businesses to the main lines are made of lead.

Department of Public Works Superintendent Dustin Martin said this survey comes after the state passed the Lead Pipe Right to Know Act requiring water providers to take public inventory of their tubes by Oct. 16.

The federal Environmental Protection Agency also recently announced plans to potentially create new rules in the coming fall, which would require the replacing of lead water laterals across the country by 2037, as lead in drinking water has long been known to cause a variety of health and mental damages, especially in children.

Lead is a neurotoxin. Exposure to it can cause cancers, as well as heart and brain damage in adults and is worse for children whose brains are developing, with neurological damage, behavioral issues and even aggression being linked effects.

“There is no safe level of lead exposure,” according to the EPA.

Martin and Chief Water Operator David Lewis said there aren’t many lead laterals in the village that they know of — most are brass or copper — but this survey will give them a better idea of the scope.

Although the survey is voluntary, they are asking everyone who gets one in the village to fill it out to give them the best idea of where there are lead pipes.

Every municipality in the state that provides water is required to do this, Lewis said, adding that it is a massive effort. If people inspect their own water connections, it will save the village a lot of time. Otherwise, Martin said they’d need to have village employees inspect each lateral.

He said there are 2,181 water service connections throughout the village and in water districts outside the village.

The deadline to finalize the inventory is months off, but Martin said if villagers could fill out their surveys, “the sooner the better.”

Martin said the next step would be to create a plan to replace all of the lead lines. The results of the survey will inform their efforts.

If the EPA makes its proposed plans to phase out lead water lines, it would give providers three years to create a plan next year, before putting them on a 10-year schedule to replace the pipes at a minimum of 2% a year, Martin said, with a goal to be 100% lead-free within a decade after that.

Lewis said the plan for how the replacements would be paid for is still in the works. It’s unclear who the financial burden of replacing lead laterals would fall on — the homeowner, the village or the federal government.

Government mandates sometimes come with funding to do them, but not always. Lewis said there are grants and programs out there for lead line replacement, but people need to apply.

The 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law included $15 billion specifically for replacing lead service lines, as well at a $11.7 billion fund, which states could spend on replacements, among other things.

Last year, the EPA estimated there are 494,007 lead service lines in New York, around 5.38% of the total service lines in the state.

Lewis said there should not be any more lead water mains in the village. Anytime village employees have come across anything lead over the years, they replace it, he said.

Village Mayor Jimmy Williams said these requirements from the state and EPA are “amazing.”

“Any lead in the water is too much lead in the water,” he said.

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How to check for lead

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Checking if your water lateral line is lead is easy — all it takes is a penny and a magnet. These pipes enter homes in the basement, either through the wall or the floor.

The village is sending out a mailer to all water customers describing how to check pipes.

Lead pipes are a dull gray in color, not magnetic and scratch easily with coins since it is a soft metal, revealing a shiny silver color.

Galvanized pipes are also gray, but they are magnetic and hard to scratch.

Copper pipes are also not magnetic but are brown, bronze or green in color — depending on how long they’ve been there, and are the color of a penny when scratched.

Plastic tubes aren’t metal and are typically blue or black in color.

If anyone has trouble determining if their pipes are lead or not, they can call the village at 518-891-4160 or 518-891-3037 to schedule an appointment with a water operator to visit and make a determination.

Lead Service Line Inventory – Saranac Lake Village_3057

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Lead behind

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The use of lead pipes in plumbing was banned in the U.S. in 1986, but the harms of lead poisoning were well known at least a century earlier, with some accounts putting knowledge of lead’s danger thousands of years ago.

Lobbying from the Lead Industries Association kept their products in common use in communities and homes around the country, sometimes by using racist conceptions to shift the blame onto the minority communities lead exposure affected most.

When the ban came, it only applied to installation. The lead pipes already in the ground were allowed to stay — until now.

The EPA is also proposing to lower the measured level of lead in drinking water which triggers action from 15 parts per billion to 10 ppb.

New York schools currently set this at 5 ppb for their water systems.