Heads rolled at Ohio’s Environmental Protection Agency for not warning residents of a small town about lead contaminating their drinking water.
The state agency fired and demoted several employees Wednesday night for not fulfilling their duties to protect the health and safety of residents whose water supply had been contaminated by the dangerous metal.
The disciplinary action followed an internal review that the Ohio EPA conducted of its handling of water-supply testing for the small town of Sebring, southeast of Cleveland. The review followed the crisis in Flint, Mich., where thousands of the city’s residents were exposed for months to drinking water contaminated by high levels of lead.
Two Ohio EPA employees were terminated at the central office, and one official was demoted at its Northeast District Office for issues related to not warning residents of contaminated water. The agency also is sending recommendations to the state’s congressional delegation for legislation “for improvements to federal lead rules, including challenges with the federal timelines for notification.” The Michigan delegation already has introduced similar legislation.
The Flint crisis turned into a scandal when it was found that local, state and federal officials did not warn residents after knowing the danger for months.
Ohio EPA Director Craig Butler learned last month that water treatment officials in Sebring had failed to properly notify customers of lead levels in certain homes “and repeatedly failed to provide timely and accurate information to the agency’s field office.”
“Ohio EPA issued a notice of violation to the village on Jan. 21 requiring that it take corrective action and notify its customers immediately,” Ohio EPA said.
“The agency also issued emergency orders prohibiting James Bates, the village’s water treatment plant operator, from operating any public water system in Ohio and revoked his license,” the agency added.
Butler also started a review of the Ohio EPA’s internal protocols and timelines to determine “why it took until Jan. 21, 2016, for him to be notified when these actions might have been taken sooner to protect the citizens of Sebring.”
