Readings taken when chemicals were added skewed results
By Dave Fidlin
Correspondent
To comply with federal and state laws, the City of Whitewater recently published a notice about the detection of high levels of fluoride in the municipal water supply. As it turns out, however, the notice has been a case of much ado about nothing.
Assistant City Manager Chris McDonell came before the Common Council on Oct. 6 and discussed the reason high fluoride levels were detected. The readings had nothing to do with actual realities, he asserted.
“For whatever reason, we’ve had a water reading tap that was about 3 or 4 inches away from a filter injector,” McDonell said. “We should not have been taking samples at that point.”
The city’s water filtration plant runs a multi-tiered process that includes filtering the supply added into the municipal system and subsequently adding a range of chemicals, including fluoride.
Unbeknown to city staffers, water quality readings were taken at the same moment fluoride was being added into the system. McDonell said the close proximity of the two devices resulted in higher than normal readings.
“We should not have been taking samples at that point,” McDonell said, pointing out skewed results ensued.
City staffers were almost immediately alerted to the abnormal readings, and while the reason for the occurrence was almost immediately detected, officials still had to publish the notice of the findings in accordance with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the state Department of Natural Resources (DNR).
“The DNR understands. We provided documentation of when the test was taken,” McDonell said. “The EPA also understands, but they still required we publish the notice.”
City Manager Cameron Clapper said the issue has since been resolved. The reading tap located near the filter injector has been removed.
“I look for things to make me smile at work every day,” Clapper said. “This is actually a point of some humor. I think it’s miraculous we haven’t run into this problem any time in the past.”
