Flint currently in violation of Federal Safe Drinking Water Act

In a letter to city leaders on March 3, the Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy said Flint is in violation of the Safe Drinking Water Act.

Specifically, the city hasn't done enough testing for lead and copper in tap water.

Under the law, the city is required to collect samples from 60 confirmed Tier 1 sites every six months. Those samples must be tested for lead and copper, and the results must be reported to EGLE.

Tier 1 sites are homes with lead service lines.

EGLE found that Flint sampled 123 sites, and only 49 were Tier 1.

According to Flint Mayor Sheldon Neeley's office, it's a little more complicated than that.

Neeley says the pool to pick Tier 1 samples from has gotten smaller, as the city has replaced 9,500 water lines and done 25,000 excavations.

Of the homes that are still Tier 1, Neeley says many of the residents aren't interested.

" Sometimes residents don't allow you inside their homes to get tested," said Mayor Neeley. "Sometimes it's problematic when you go into a residential home and ask can you test their water... sometimes they say no."

According to EGLE, the city was out of compliance for during the July - December 2019 monitoring period.

Mayor Neeley took office in November, and says he had a limited amount of time to play catch up.

"We had to really engage this process and really hit the ground running, and we did some really good work," said Neeley. "I'm sure when we have a full cycle under this administration, that we will do much better."

In the letter, EGLE recognized that the city "put forth a significant effort, despite an administration change near the end of the monitoring period, to obtain the requisite samples".

EGLE also applauded the mayor's efforts, going door-to-door, trying to get resident participation.

To return to compliance, the city needs 60 samples from Tier 1 sites from January - June 2020. Samples will need to be submitted to the Drinking Water and Environmental Health Division (DWEHD).

Neeley says they're already halfway toward that.