Nancy Colas is a small business owner from Newburgh, New York. She and her family tested above the Environmental Protection Agency’s maximum level for perfluorooctanesulfonic acid last year. (Photo by Elissa Nuñez/News21)

NEWBURGH, N.Y. – When Newburgh’s city manager declared a state of emergency last year after tests found dangerous levels of perfluorooctanesulfonic acid in the city’s water supply, Nancy Colas scheduled blood tests for everyone in her family.

“My 17-year-old, he pretty much grew up here, and he’s been drinking that water all his life,”  she said.

The Colas family tested well above the the maximum level allowed by the Environmental Protection Agency. PFOS, a dangerous chemical found in firefighting foam, has been linked to cancer and other medical problems.

“There are effects that I wonder how it’s going to affect us down the line,” Colas said. “Cognitively, are my children going to be OK as they get older?”

Newburgh, a poor city filled with black and Latino residents, is one of many communities of color whose water has been contaminated by nearby Superfund or hazardous waste sites. In this case, the Stewart Air National Guard Base leaked PFOS into the town’s lakes and reservoirs.

Colas, like a growing number of Newburgh residents, is suing the city of Newburgh for negligence, contending that city officials were long aware of the problem before they declared a state of emergency, putting residents at greater risk of illness.

“It hurts to know that they knew, and they didn’t say anything,” she said. “I’m sure there are people that knew.”

And much like other Newburgh residents, Colas also thinks that had she lived in a different town or been born a different race, she would’ve never been exposed to PFOS.

“It is an environmental justice issue because if we were sitting in Deer Park, Long Island, I don’t think it would have ever been an issue,” Colas said. “I don’t think there would have been contamination, period. Because someone would have said ‘not in my backyard.’”

The Hudson River runs alongside the city of Newburgh. (Photo by Elissa Nuñez/News21)––≠

Many residents, including city officials, said the Department of Defense would be more motivated to clean up the Superfund site if Newburgh were a whiter, more affluent town.

“It certainly feels like that might be part of it, because why are they ignoring us?” said Genie Abrams, a Newburgh City Council member. “Are they ignoring other communities, the wealthier communities, the whiter communities?

Some residents said town meetings meant to update residents are poorly publicized. Many still haven’t been blood tested, specifically in the Spanish-speaking community. The city government has posted materials in both Spanish and Creole on its website, but community activists said it’s not enough.

“For this level of danger, there should be letters being sent out to every single home periodically to update, and that’s not happening in English and Spanish,” said Kevindaryan Lujan, a Newburgh resident. “So this is an issue the community is concerned about. And there’s whole bulks of the community that are unaware of what’s going on.”

The state Department of Environmental Conservation is working to complete a multimillion dollar filtration plant to treat Newburgh’s poisoned water by October. State officials and environmental experts are pressing the Department of Defense to clean up contamination at the Superfund site.

“The federal and the state government have really been passing the buck to each other on this issue, no one really wants to take care of it,” Lujan said. “It’s kind of being put under the rug, and people are still scared.”

Newburgh will return to its original water supply in the fall when the filtration plant is fully constructed. “We need to have clean water here, it’s a basic human right for anyone, no matter what your income level is,” Abrams said.

To see the full News21 report on “Troubled Water,” go to troubledwater.news21.com on Aug. 14.

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Janet McMahan shows documentail that detail water pollution in southeast Georgia. (Photo by Brandon Kitchin/News21)

WAYCROSS, Ga. – Janet McMahan has a message for southeast Georgia, and it is the one printed on her T-shirt: “No cure until you stop the cause, test your water, get a filter.”

In 2014, McMahan became committed to improving water quality after she lost her 28-year-old son to a rare form of cancer she believes he got from drinking contaminated water.

“I started to get the health department to warn people to test their water, (but) they said they were not allowed to tell people to test the water,” said McMahan, who lives in Ocilla, Georgia.

She said she believes government neglect and lack of awareness contributed to health problems in her family. McMahan, her son Ben and her two Labrador retrievers were all diagnosed with cancer in 2009. After the four rare cancer diagnoses, McMahan felt confident she knew the cause: the water they were drinking.

She had read an article about Bangladesh, where millions of people were being exposed to arsenic in their drinking water from wells. McMahan and her family also depend on well water.

When she had her well water tested, it showed negligible levels of arsenic, she said. However, she said her water heater had toxic levels of the cancer-causing chemical in it. She said she later found unsafe levels of lead and radon as well.

Arsenic is a known human carcinogen associated with skin, lung and bladder cancer, according to the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. It also has been connected with kidney and liver cancer.

The U.S. government has limits on how much arsenic is allowed in drinking water. The maximum level of inorganic arsenic permitted is 10 parts per billion. While public water systems are frequently tested for it, there are no regulations that mandate testing of water from private wells.

“All they had to do was tell us there was arsenic in the water, and we would have bought a filter … and my son would still be here,” she said.

After she lost her son, she became active in the community and told people to get their water tested. Her efforts have been praised by well-known environmental advocate Erin Brockovich and have earned McMahan the nickname, “The Georgia Water Lady.”

Janet McMahan McMahan became committed to improving water quality after she lost her 28-year-old son to a rare form of cancer she believes he got from drinking contaminated water.
(Photo courtesy of Janet McMahan)

“I’m doing this for Ben because I could not keep him alive,” she said. “This way, I’m keeping him alive. I’m doing this in his memory. He deserved better.”

She recently helped residents of Mount Pleasant, South Carolina, where some people voiced concerns that pesticides in the water could be causing brain cancers.

For several years, she has worked closely with the environmental activist group Silent Disaster of Waycross, Georgia. Members believe local industries have polluted waterways, which have resulted in increased rates of childhood cancer and caused other diseases.

“These people need to know what they’ve been exposed to,” she said.

McMahan and her husband Howard McMahan, a family physician, have used their platform in the medical community to alert patients, other professionals and politicians that water contamination can cause cancer and other illness.

The couple has met with top National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences officials in Washington, D.C., and U.S. Rep. Austin Scott to express concerns on a national level.

McMahan’s ultimate goal is to raise awareness about water contamination to prevent any more unnecessary death.

“Ben didn’t have to die – that it was greed that put him 6 feet under. It was politicians that put him 6 feet under,” she said. “It was not knowing, doctors not knowing, people not knowing, that the water was causing cancer is what put him 6 feet under. And if he could do anything about it, he would have. He helped everybody. He was just loved by everybody, especially me.”

To see the full News21 report on “Troubled Water,” go to troubledwater.news21.com on Aug. 14.

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When Lori Clark woke up from a 43-day medically induced coma, she realized she could no longer mover her limbs. Doctors placed Clark in a coma to try and treat Legionnaires’ disease she contracted at a hotel in New York state. (Photo by Karl Schneider/News21)

ALBANY, N.Y. – Doctors twice notified Lori Clark’s family that they expected her to die.

Clark, a project manager who lives in upstate New York, was placed in a chemically induced coma for 43 days after she was diagnosed with Legionnaires’ disease in 2011. She initially thought she had the flu and delayed seeing a doctor. The last thing she remembers before waking up from the coma is her son rushing her to hospital.

“I couldn’t feel my limbs, was coughing all the time and had a really high temperature,” she said.

Legionnaires’ disease is a severe form of pneumonia caused by the waterborne bacteria legionella. People may contract Legionnaires’ when they breathe in water mists contaminated with legionella, or when drinking water goes down the wrong pipe and into the lungs. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says people above the age of 50 or those with underlying health conditions are most at risk from the disease.

Clark was 46 years old when she was diagnosed. She also suffers from rheumatoid arthritis and lupus, and she went into septic shock and organ failure after contracting Legionnaires’ disease. Her fingers caved in while she was in the coma because she couldn’t take her arthritis medication, she said.

“Before Legionnaires’? I could walk. I could run. I could ride my bike. I could garden, and I could bend over. Life after legionnaires? Not so much,” said Clark, now 54. “I will never see another country unless they build a bridge. I will never get on a plane after this as I’m more susceptible to pneumonia now. I can no longer type properly as my fingers curled up while I was in the coma… Legionella is a killer, and people need to pay more attention to it.”

Legionnaires’ wasn’t something that ever concerned Clark before her diagnosis. She knew it existed, but she never thought she was at risk. Now, after the disease nearly killed her, she finds herself angered by the fact that thousands of people are affected by this waterborne illness every year.

“I’m reading about it in the news every day. How could I not be mad?” she said. “People in power need to see the light and understand that they are playing with people’s lives. They’re  shirking their responsibility for the public’s health. I invite them to go through what I went through.”

Clark’s lungs now only function at 50 percent capacity. She has to work from home most days, and she can no longer travel by airplane or do the hobbies she once enjoyed.

Doctors diagnosed Lori Clark with Legionnaires’ disease in January 2011. Clark first noticed symptoms when she began coughing after a visit to a hotel in New York state. Doctors induced Clark into a chemical coma for 43 days to try and treat the disease. (Photo by Karl Schneider/News21)

“Mentally, it gets easier. Physically, it doesn’t,” she said. “Anxiety levels subside after a while, but in the beginning, I felt like I was walking through a minefield every time I went out in public. I was like a ticking timebomb. If I couldn’t tie my shoe. I would fly off the handle.”

Potable water is one of the most common sources of legionella, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. But health experts argue that officials tend to ignore drinking water supplies when it comes to identifying sources of legionella contamination.

Brad Considine, director of strategic planning with the Alliance to Prevent Legionnaires’ Disease, said officials need to start “facing the facts.”

“When outbreaks happen, health departments look to cooling towers and air-conditioning systems, but research shows potable water is the often the main source,” Considine said.

“By ignoring domestic water systems, they are putting people’s health at risk. We were given bodies that fend off all these threats that we live with, but there’s some things we shouldn’t have to fight.”

Clark sued the hotel where she contracted Legionnaires’ for negligence.

She was there for a three-day work event, and she used the spa and pool facilities, the restrooms and drank the water. A week later, she was fighting for her life. It turned out the hotel never informed guests that elevated levels of legionella had been found in the water system a month earlier, she said.

Health inspectors said it was possible she contracted it from the spa and pool, but like in most Legionnaires’ cases, it is difficult to identify the exact source.

Her attorney, Michael Conway, of Harris, Conway & Donovan, said most Legionnaires’ cases settle as people don’t want it known publicly that their water systems are contaminated.

“Because it’s often difficult to identify the source of contamination, people tend not to take legal action as they believe they’re fighting a losing battle,” he said.

The CDC reports that about one in 10 people die from the lung condition, and Clark considers herself lucky to be on the right side of that statistic. The CDC also says that legionella has been responsible for 66 percent of waterborne disease outbreaks associated with drinking water in the U.S., while the number of cases has risen since 2000.

For Clark, that’s the most frustrating part. In her opinion, officials aren’t dealing with the problem.

“It’s entirely preventable. That’s one of the saddest things,” she said. “None of this has to happen. I feel for the families and the individuals who have to go through this. I’m lucky to be alive.”

To see the full News21 report on “Troubled Water,” go to troubledwater.news21.com on Aug. 14.

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A flag in the city of Waukesha is displayed downtown. (Photo by Rachel Konieczny/News21)

WAUKESHA, Wisc. – The city of Waukesha has a radium problem, and it’s looking to Lake Michigan for a solution.

Although talks of drawing water from nearby Lake Michigan began in 2002, Waukesha has struggled with radium contamination since the late 1970s when the Environmental Protection Agency lowered the acceptable limit for radium in public drinking water systems.

In 2010, Waukesha submitted an application to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources for an alternative water supply from Lake Michigan, citing its radium contamination, depleting aquifer and unsustainable water supply.

The more than $200 million proposal, known as the Great Water Alliance, will return 100 percent of the used water back into the lake. The city plans to draw 10-million gallons of water per day from Lake Michigan.

The Great Lakes Compact, the legally binding agreement crafted by the eight Great Lakes states and two Canadian provinces, details how the states and provinces regulate the Great Lake Basin’s water supply. Any community applying for a diversion must demonstrate it has exhausted all other options for getting water, according to the compact’s website.

Waukesha met the compact’s requirements, and the governments involved supported the agreement.

However, individuals have mixed feelings about the alliance. While residents mainly argue the project will hurt the city economically because water rates will increase, water advocacy groups cite the effect the diversion will have on the Root River carrying water back to Lake Michigan and on the lake itself.

Sandy Hamm, Waukesha resident, said he thinks the diversion of water from Lake Michigan to Waukesha is unreasonable. (Photo by Rachel Konieczny/News21)

Waukesha resident Sandy Hamm said the diversion is unreasonable.

“It’s just foolhardy to be pumping water from Lake Michigan 20-some miles out here and then pumping it back,” Hamm said.

Cheryl Nenn, riverkeeper at the nonprofit group Milwaukee Riverkeeper, said her organization also opposes the diversion.

Cheryl Nenn, riverkeeper at the Milwaukee Riverkeeper group, said her organization opposes the diversion of water from Lake Michigan to Waukesha. (Photo by Rachel Konieczny/News21)

“We’ve never thought the diversion was the best option for Waukesha. We always thought they were asking for a lot more water than they were currently using,” Nenn said, referencing the city’s average daily water use of 6 million gallons in contrast to the proposal’s 10 million gallons. Nenn said the city must be prepared to extinguish a fire with its largest facility out of service.

Nenn said the Root River, which will carry water back to Lake Michigan, could have increased algae blooms due to higher amounts of nutrients entering the river.

“When there’s lower flow (during the summer), the pollution is more concentrated in the river so that’s something we would be concerned about,” Nenn said.

However, Waukesha resident Chris Curren said he supports the project.

“Other than figuring out how to pay for it, I’m for it,” Curren said. “Those against it seem to be because they think it will open up a floodgate, allowing other cities to do the same.”

One of those residents, Laurie Longtine, said she thinks the city is setting a negative legal precedent.

“I can just see a scenario where another community within the Great Lakes basin decides to apply for water … to grow and keep expanding,” said Longtine, a board member of the Waukesha County Environmental Action League. “All of these other communities could all stick a straw in it at any time and withdraw.”

While officials said they believe the city’s aquifer is declining and cited that as one of the reasons for the diversion, residents say otherwise.

Like Longtine, Waukesha resident Steve Edlund agrees the aquifer is rising. He began researching the United States Geological Survey’s data on the city’s aquifer in 2013 and found it was no longer declining 5 to 9 feet per year, but rather increasing.

However, Dan Duchniak, Waukesha Water Utility general manager, said the aquifer levels frequently fluctuate, causing the aquifer to appear to be rising.

Dan Duchniak, Waukesha Water Utility general manager, said the Great Water Alliance will likely be completed by 2023. The alliance will divert water from Lake Michigan to Waukesha. (Photo by Rachel Konieczny/News21)

Edlund said the radium problem is practically a nonissue, citing the city’s reluctance to install radium filters on four of the system’s wells that he said would effectively eliminate the contamination.

Duchniak said the diversion is not just about radium. He also identified total dissolved solids, or saltwater, as an additional contaminant.

“If this was just about radium, it would have been an easy solution,” Duchniak said. “It’s not just about radium – it’s about a sustainable water supply because we have other contaminants that we’ll have to deal with, and there’s other emerging contaminants that are coming down the pipeline.”

Edlund said he is also concerned with the socioeconomic impact the diversion will have on the community.

“There is no public assistance for your water bill and that’s scary,” Edlund said. “This is going to have a huge impact, especially on people that are lower income or fixed income. They are not going to be able to afford to live in the city of Waukesha. They’ll be forced out of their homes.”

The diversion does not have a definitive route for the pipeline yet. However, the project is expected to be completed by 2023, Duchniak said.

To see the full News21 report on “Troubled Water,” go troubledwater.news21.com on Aug. 14.

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Andree Davis stands in front of her home in Walnut Cove, North Carolina. Davis said she believes her well water has caused dark spots on her skin. (Photo by Jasmine Spearing-Bowen/News21)

WALNUT COVE, N.C. – Andree Davis said she tries not to go out in public: She’s afraid of how people will react when they see her.

The 67-year-old North Carolina resident has dark spots all over her body. Davis said when she absolutely has to leave her house, she always wears long sleeves and pants – even in the hottest weather.

“I started getting all these spots, and I thought it was the water of course, but I couldn’t prove it,” she said. “It’s everywhere – like on my stomach and just everywhere. It’s unbelievable.”

She moved from South Carolina to Walnut Cove in 2007 after inheriting family property. In 2012, she started developing the spots. Davis said new spots only appear when she showers with the water from her well. For a while, she showered at a nearby hotel and said she didn’t get any new spots, but the hotel became too expensive.

Davis blames her well water because she knows it contains chemicals such as chromium 6 and vanadium. In 2015, the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality sent notices to nearly 1,000 households located near coal-fired power plants across the state advising them to use bottled water for drinking, cooking and brushing their teeth. The water wasn’t safe, the notice said, but it didn’t indicate the source of the pollutants.

Residents later received a second letter telling them their water was OK to drink, leaving many residents unsure of whether or not their water was safe.

Davis lives next to a Duke Energy power plant that burns coal and creates a byproduct referred to as coal ash. Companies often store this type of waste in large pits called impoundments, usually near waterways.

Duke Energy officials said they plan to excavate coal ash ponds at eight of its 14 plants across the state. However, the company plans to leave coal ash at Belews Creek Steam Plant (pictured here) near Walnut Cove, North Carolina. (Photo by Chelsea Ray Ybanez/News21)

Duke spokeswoman Paige Sheehan said the company is not the source of well pollution. However, the state passed legislation, the Coal Ash Management Act in 2014 and House Bill 630 in 2016, that requires Duke to close all coal ash impoundments, either by digging it up and storing it elsewhere or by putting a protective covering over the ash and leaving it where it is, a practice known as capping-in-place.

Environmental groups across North Carolina have pushed Duke to dig up the coal ash the company has stored in ponds across the state. Duke has roughly 150 million tons impounded in the state, a company spokeswoman said in an email.

Duke officials said they plan to excavate coal ash ponds at eight of the 14 plants across the state, but the company plans to leave coal ash in place at several locations, including Belews Creek Steam Plant near Walnut Cove, where Davis lives.

As part of the state legislation, Duke must provide alternative drinking water sources, in the form of city water or filtration systems, to anyone living within half a mile of its coal-fired power plants. Duke has until 2018 to provide the alternative water sources, and it has been providing bottled water for residents since 2015.

The company also has offered affected coal-plant neighbors an optional $5,000 payment and money to offset other costs, but accepting it means waiving their rights to sue Duke in the future.

Tracey Edwards, a Walnut Cove resident, said nobody she knows plans to take the money because “people aren’t that stupid.” She believes coal ash is the source of the chemicals in the water.

“You’re trying to be a good so called ‘neighbor’ by providing water, who does that? If you aren’t guilty, why are you getting involved at all? Am I right or wrong? Why would you give all these people, for this period of time, all this free water?” Edwards said. “That’s not being a good neighbor. You’re guilty, and you’re trying to buy people off, simple as that.”

Tracey Edwards stands in the front yard of her home in Walnut Cove, North Carolina. She blames coal ash for contaminanting the water in her community. (Photo by Jasmine Spearing-Bowen/News21)

Debra Watts, from the North Carolina Division of Water Resources, said they are still working on site assessments to determine the source of the contamination. But the state legislation mandating Duke provide water to residents near coal ash was a protective measure, she said.

Duke will connect residents to city water if they live in more urban areas such as Belmont. But for rural areas such as Walnut Cove and Roxboro, Sheehan said the residents live too far from city water sources to provide water, and filtration systems are the best and most cost effective option.

Cathy Cralle Jones, an attorney representing some residents, said access to city water is important for the future of these communities.

“It brings value to that community, to be able to embrace future development,” she said. “If filtration systems are the only option for those communities, in my perspective, those areas are doomed to long-term economic depression.”

She also said rural communities are at a disadvantage because they don’t have as strong a voice as some more populated areas.

“It is just harder for these more rural communities to organize in the same way,” she said. “I do think there is a low-income, racial component that has prevented the kind of attention and equity for these plants versus the more urban settings.”

Davis saw a doctor about her skin condition initially, but she said none of the creams they prescribed helped clear up her spots.

She was in the process of selling her home when she got her letter. Davis said she feels stuck in a house she can’t sell because of the contaminated well.

She spent a large portion of her retirement savings on fixing up the house, and can’t afford to move until it’s sold. Davis said she feels like she’s in prison.

“I’m not going to say I haven’t been through things, but I can work them out and take care of them,” she said. “But this is non-ending. And I don’t see any light at the end of the tunnel. And I don’t want to end up this being my final resting place.”

Come back Aug. 14 to see the full News21 report on “Troubled Water.”

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Cows feed inside a barn at Dairy Dreams, a large-scale dairy operated by Don Niles in Kewaunee, Wisconsin. (Photo by Chelsea Rae Ybanez/News21)

KEWAUNEE COUNTY, Wisc. – In 2014, a study by U.S. Department of Agriculture researcher Mark Borchardt indicated that 40 of 131 residential wells sampled in Kewaunee County were contaminated with bovine feces.

Lynn Utesch, the founder of environmental advocacy group Kewaunee Cares, sees the presence of bovine feces in the water as coinciding with the expansion of large-scale dairy farms, known as Confined Animal Feeding Operations, in the area.

Kewaunee has 16 of these large-scale farms, with many of those managing thousands of cows – many more than the traditional farmers that once dominated the area.

Lee Luft, chairman of the Kewaunee County Groundwater Task Force, has been focusing on groundwater issues associated with large-scale dairy farming practices.

“We saw a very substantial increase in herd counts over the past 20 years or so,” he said. “In fact, Kewaunee County has seen the fastest herd growth of any county in the state by far.”

Luft explained that these large herds have exactly the impact one would imagine. “There ends up being high volumes of liquid manure” he said.

The concentration of feces – human and otherwise – has profound health implications. The contaminated groundwater is filled with coliform, E. coli and nitrates, which can lead to anything from serious bacterial infections to cancer.

“It definitely has an effect on our population in their health and the health for our children,” Utesch said.

Kewaunee Cares, which is made up of residents and small farmers, has focused on putting constraints on the practices of large farms in the county. These farms house between 1,000 and 6,000 cows in a handful of sheds across just 1 to 2 acres of a larger 40 to 60-acre lot.

That leaves behind high volumes of liquid manure concentrated on a small bit of land, making it more likely for that manure to seep down through the soil and into the groundwater.

Lynn Utesch unwinds fencing to stake around the pasture on his small dairy farm in Kewaunee, Wisconsin, before allowing his cows to graze. (Photo by Chelsea Rae Ybanez/News21)

Utesch said he believes these large-scale farming practices are causing the contamination. His group continues to look at the effects of industrial agriculture, push the county to set requirements on farms for things like manure spreading and petition the Environmental Protection Agency to intervene under the Safe Drinking Water Act.

On the other side, large farm owners point to residential septics as another source of feces, but they don’t entirely deny the role their manure plays.

Don Niles is the president of Peninsula Pride Farms, a watershed initiative in Kewaunee County made from an alliance of large farm owners. In an online mission statement, the group said it’s “committed to protecting, nurturing and sustaining our precious soil, water and air.”

“Agriculture plays a role in environmental challenges in our county,” Niles said. “We’re the major use of land, and we have the major responsibility.”

His operation uses a methane digester to treat waste from his cows. “We use things like methane digesters to create green power but also reduce the pathogens in the manure,” he said of the building-sized machine that cost him millions.

Don Niles, owner of Dairy Dreams farm in Wisconsin, stands along the center corridor in one of his barns, surrounded by hundreds of his cows. (Photo by Chelsea Rae Ybanez/News21)

Still, Utesch said measures like this fall short, and the only solution is for these farms to take responsibility for specific wells their manure contaminates.

If residents can prove a specific farm contaminated their well, there is some legal recourse available. In situations like this, the Department of Natural Resources will intervene to compel the farm to pay for a replacement water source. Or residents can lodge a civil court case against the farm.

However, pinning contamination on a specific farm is complicated.

Jesse Jerabek, an architect in Kewaunee County, doesn’t own a single cow. In the short time after the expansion of Kinnard Farms down the road from him, he said his water became contaminated. While he feels the connection is obvious, proving it is another matter.

Borchardt said that requires technique called “microbial source tracking.” He explains that this method “could link a contamination event in a well to a particular farm,” and even more specifically “could link it to a particular cow.” The process matches animal DNA found in contaminated water to DNA in the manure on a farm.

Calves are tagged at Dairy Dreams, a large-scale dairy operated by Don Niles in Kewaunee, Wisconsin. (Photo by Chelsea Rae Ybanez/News21)

But there’s a catch. To work, a farm needs to provide a manure sample, something that may go against its own interests.

Niles expressed doubts about the technique, which is used routinely by microbiologists. “Even if you found out that it was bovine, there (are) 100 plus farms in the county,” he said. “How would you necessarily know which farm it came from?”

Beyond this, Niles said he also hesitates because of the high cost of the test.

Niles said he hopes his efforts help make Kewaunee water safe down the road.

“We’re not slowing down our program. We’re speeding up,” he said. “I think it’s gonna take us a long ways.”

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