Bay City outlines lead service‑line replacement plan; staff says work accelerated but timeline depends on funding and authorizations

Marty Jurish, the city’s water distribution metering manager, told the Bay City City Commission on April 21 that the city has completed thousands of water-service replacements as part of a state-driven effort to remove lead lines, but that finishing the work will require more funding and homeowner approvals.

Jurish said the program has “completed close to 3,000 services,” and that the city’s database and GIS mapping now show which addresses remain to be completed. He told commissioners the city tapped a $5,000,000 loan and a $3,000,000 grant in 2019, received $10,000,000 from the city’s ARPA allocation and that the remaining cost to finish the work is “somewhere between $20 and $30 million.”

The presentation outlined how the department inventories service lines using century‑old logbooks and modern GIS, prioritizes emergencies and sites with high lead test results, and uses specialized equipment — including hydraulic “pipe puller” tools — to replace long services without trenching.

Why it matters: Lead service lines are a public‑health concern and the state and federal requirements for inventories and replacements create schedules and grant/loan conditions the city must meet. Jurish said the city’s combination of grants, loans, ARPA money and yearly utility allocations has kept work moving without a broad rate increase for customers.

Details and debate

Jurish told commissioners the city’s records date service lines back to the 1870s and that the department has used logbooks and card files to build a GIS layer identifying remaining lead and galvanized services. He said the GIS dashboard — available to staff and the public — shows completed addresses in blue and outstanding addresses in red; one dashboard figure cited in his slides listed about 3,926 addresses still needing work, but Jurish noted that the count was a few weeks out of date.

On funding, Jurish said the city used an approximately $5 million loan and a $3 million grant in 2019, and later set aside $10 million of ARPA funds to support replacements. He added that the city currently applies roughly $300,000 annually from utility charges (reported in the presentation as a combined roughly $600,000 per year directed toward lead replacement) and that staff estimates a ballpark total of $20–30 million is needed to complete the remaining work.

Commissioners pressed on prioritization, timelines and participation. Commissioner Coakley asked whether any service lines from 1872 remain; Jurish said some early‑20th‑century services likely remain but that the specific 1872 entry referenced in the logbooks was on a street that no longer exists. Commissioner Bernie Obershaw repeatedly raised concerns about whether older, lower‑income neighborhoods were being prioritized; Jurish said he prioritizes “neighborhoods with the most consolidated amount of lead service lines,” construction projects and emergency calls, not property values. “If I had my choice, they’d all get done first, but I don’t have that option,” Jurish said.

Commissioner Tenney asked whether the city could do anything to reduce staff turnover in the department; Jurish replied that hiring and fit for the job were the main drivers and that the department still expects to meet the state’s inventory and replacement deadlines with current and anticipated funding.

Technical approach and public outreach

Jurish demonstrated video and photos of a cable‑pull method that, he said, can remove 30–35 feet of service rapidly while minimizing lawn and street restoration impacts. He said the city owns two of the pipe‑pulling machines (the presentation noted an initial purchase about $63,000) and uses hydro‑vac equipment to verify service materials at the curb stop.

For water quality and public health the city provides filters and bottled water to households that test above action levels and places such households on a high‑priority list for replacement. Jurish said homes serving schools and day care centers are being handled as priorities and that the city offers information and a dashboard to let owners check their service status online.

What comes next

Jurish said the state’s EPA‑driven rules that increase inventory sampling thresholds will take effect in 2027 and that, after ARPA funding is spent, the city anticipates it will need to continue replacing several hundred services per year to meet inventory and replacement targets. He said staff are pursuing additional grants and foundation support and are considering an ordinance option to allow tenants to sign authorization forms when landlords are out of town.

“Once we spend all of the ARPA money, we should be down to under 2,000 households yet to do,” Jurish said. “If I can do 300, 400, 500 a year, which we’re capable of doing, I think my staff could handle that.”

Ending

Jurish closed by inviting commissioners and residents to the city’s online dashboard and educational videos and by saying the department will continue to seek grants and partnerships to accelerate replacements.