“I could cry, actually,” Jeanne Desrochers, chair of the district’s prudential committee, said outside the new facility that night as she waited for townspeople to arrive for an open house. “It’s been a lot of work — a lot of effort — by a lot of people, and we’re very happy that we’re at this point.”
About 20 people showed up to celebrate at the small, stone-brick building on a hill not far from the Coventry Community Center. The facility houses a filtration system that works to remove arsenic, iron and manganese from water.
The fire district, which serves about 250 people through 60 connections around town, has been flirting with state and federal limits on arsenic levels since 2016 — and has exceeded the max levels several times. The quality issues have driven many locals to rely on bottled water for years.
The district was in violation of the Safe Water Drinking Act for 11 consecutive quarters from July 2016 to the end of March 2019 because of its arsenic levels, according to data from the federal Environmental Protection Agency. Data for the latest quarter, from April to the end of June, is not available.
The maximum level of arsenic allowed in drinking water by state and federal regulators is 0.010 milligrams per liter. State Agency of Natural Resources data shows the fire district exceeded that limit in a July 2016 test. From that point until the end of June 2019, the average result of state chemical tests was 0.009 mg/L.
Tests registered levels above the max limit eight times in that span, with the latest in February, at 0.011 mg/L, according to the data. A public notice issued by the district in April suggested people “consider other sources of water for drinking, cooking, or making baby formula,” despite labelling the situation as “not an emergency.”
Water treated on July 8 by the new system — referred to as “finished water,” which was available to drink at the open house — showed an arsenic concentration 0.0056 mg/L, according to state data.
The fire district received a $992,000 grant and a $298,000 loan from the U.S. Department of Agriculture last August to complete the project, as well as $40,000 from the Environmental Protection Agency’s Drinking Water State Revolving Fund. The system was designed by the Springfield-based Dufresne Group and built by J.P. Sicard of Barton.
“I think it’s fabulous,” resident Jennifer Mason said after looking at the inside of the facility “It’s absolutely wonderful to have it done and to be turning on the tap and drinking water.”
Mason and her sister, Stephanie Currier, both live within the fire district and came to the event Friday to see the hopeful conclusion of a long journey.
“This is a day of appreciation,” Currier said. “A lifetime of appreciation.”
Neither had been drinking tap water since the onset of the arsenic issue, instead buying bottled water.
Resident Marth Sylvester has also been buying water instead of drinking from her tap — but she said she doesn’t plan to stop soon.
Sylvester — referred to by Deroschers as “one of our chief critics” in a speech that night — believes water in the fire district may still have problems with PFAS chemicals. She said she’ll keep buying water weekly until she sees the results of future testing.
Town delinquent tax collector Kate Fletcher, another critic of the fire district, wasn’t at the event Friday. She told VTDigger via phone that she “can only hope” the new system improves water quality.
She said that, over the years, contaminated water has stained her clothes and prevented her family from bathing regularly.
At a June 19 district meeting, she held up a mason jar filled with tan-colored water as an example of what had come from her tap. She said Friday that the need for a treatment system could have been avoided.
Attendees of the event carried a more celebratory mood.
“You should take a moment just to recognize that you’re not just a gorgeous, beautiful town in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont, where you can sip a fabulous clear fresh glass of water,” Department of Environmental Conservation Commissioner Emily Boedecker said. “But you have done something that can take other communities years and years.”
