In December 2012 a regional official from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency came to Lititz to present an award to Lititz Borough and Warwick Township. The recognition, a source water protection award from EPA’s Mid-Atlantic region, followed a nomination by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection.
Four years later the same state agency told both municipalities that their lead and copper sampling between 2010 and 2013 had not met federal and state rules. The overlap became one of the more pointed details of the 2016 coverage of lead in Lititz water.
Two different things being measured
The award and the violations were not measuring the same thing, and it is fair to say so plainly.
Source water protection is about the supply before it reaches the treatment plant: keeping wells, springs and aquifers clean, managing land use around recharge areas, and planning for spills. In Lancaster County, where farmland and development sit close to groundwater, that work is real and worth recognizing. Lititz and Warwick had partnered on protection planning for the wells that supply the area.
The Lead and Copper Rule, by contrast, is about what happens after treatment, inside the distribution system and the plumbing of individual homes. Lead almost never comes from the source. It comes from service lines, connectors such as goosenecks, and older solder and fixtures. A system can do excellent work protecting its wells and still fall short on how it samples taps for lead.
What the state said later
The DEP notices dated March 17, 2016, found that both municipalities had not followed required sampling procedures during the 2010 to 2013 period. For the borough, the state said lead results had been reported to residents incorrectly over two years and that sampling sites had not been chosen properly. For the township, it said neither of its two systems had tested the right number or the right kind of homes. We have rewritten both stories: the borough findings and the township findings.
Reporting in 2016 also raised questions about certifications the borough had filed with the state in 2012 about its sampling sites. The DEP’s corrective instructions required the municipalities to redo their site selection and sampling according to the rule.
Why the overlap still matters
Awards help a utility show residents and funders that it takes its job seriously, and nominations are often built from paperwork the utility itself supplies. The Lititz case is a useful reminder that recognition in one program says little about compliance in another, and that the paperwork behind a nomination deserves the same scrutiny as the paperwork behind a compliance report.
It is also a reminder of why later federal changes put so much weight on public information. Since October 2024, community water systems have had to keep a public inventory of service line materials, and under the Lead and Copper Rule Improvements finalized that month, most must replace lead and galvanized lines within ten years. Residents no longer need a records request to learn what kind of pipe likely serves their home.
Where to look now
- The borough and the township each publish an annual Consumer Confidence Report by July 1. It lists the most recent lead and copper sampling results and the 90th-percentile figure.
- Both systems should be able to tell you how your service line is classified in their inventory.
- DEP’s Drinking Water Reporting System lets anyone look up a public water system’s violations and sample history by name or ID.
Source water protection and lead control are both part of safe water, and Lititz-area systems need to get both right. If you find something in the public records that contradicts what you have been told, the Contact page reaches our newsroom.