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Council OKs $2.5 million to verify lead service lines; 50% is loan forgiveness, city says
Summary
Council authorized the Oklahoma City Water Utilities Trust to accept $2.5 million from the Oklahoma Water Resources Board to field-verify potential lead service lines and continue a multi-phase replacement program. About half of the award is loan forgiveness and the remainder carries 0% interest, staff said.
The council unanimously approved a resolution authorizing the Oklahoma City Water Utilities Trust to incur indebtedness in the amount of $2,500,000 from the Oklahoma Water Resources Board (OWRB) to fund a second phase of field verification of potential lead service lines.
Chris Browning, director of Oklahoma City Water Utilities, explained the program and why the city sought the funding. “Out of our 254,000 service locations, we have identified the potential for 37,000 private service lines being lead,” Browning said. He told the council the utility completed a first phase of physical verification at 4,250 sites and found 173 lead lines among those digs. The approved $2.5 million award will fund an additional 5,000 verifications as a second phase.
Browning said the OWRB award is favorable because $1.25 million is loan forgiveness and the other $1.25 million carries 0% interest. The city will use the verification work to design a replacement program to comply with federal requirements on lead service-line replacement, Browning said.
Council members asked clarifying questions about the phase-one findings and next steps. Staff said the verification work is intended to identify where replacement is required and then design a replacement schedule; replacement itself will be a separate program and will be scheduled after the verification data are complete.
Action: council adopted the resolution authorizing the Water Utilities Trust to incur indebtedness of $2,500,000 to the OWRB; the vote was unanimous and met the required six affirmative votes for this item.
Next steps: Water Utilities will proceed with phase 2 field verification of an additional 5,000 sites and will return with a replacement plan when verification is complete.
