From the U.S. Government Accountability Office, www.gao.gov

Transcript for: Testing for Lead in Child Care Facilities' Water

Description: Exposing children to lead--in contaminated water, for
example--can lead to long-term health problems like anemia, kidney and
brain damage, as well as learning disabilities and decreased growth.
According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), child care
facilities may be at risk for elevated levels of lead in their drinking
water because they are often closed on weekends, holidays, and extended
breaks where lead in pipes and other fixtures can leach into water.
We talk to GAO education expert Jackie Nowicki--a director in our
Education, Workforce, and Income Security Team--about her recent review
of lead in child care facilities. 

Related GAO Work: GAO-20-597, Child Care Facilities: Federal Agencies
Need to Enhance Monitoring and Collaboration to Help Assure Drinking
Water is Safe from Lead

Released: October 2020

[Intro Music]

[Jackie Nowicki:] Only about one-quarter of Head Start centers,
nationwide, tested their drinking water for lead.

[Holly Hobbs:] Hi and welcome to GAO's Watchdog Report, your source for
news and information from the U.S. Government Accountability Office--
I'm Holly Hobbs.
Exposing children to lead (in contaminated water, for example) can lead
to long-term health problems like anemia, kidney and brain damage, as
well as learning disabilities and decreased growth. According to the
EPA, child care facilities may be at risk for elevated levels of lead in
their drinking water because they are often closed on weekends,
holidays, and for extended breaks where lead in pipes and other fixtures
can leach into water.

Today, we talk to Jackie Nowicki--an expert in K through 12 education,
and a director in our Education, Workforce, and Income Security
Team--about her recent review of lead in child care facilities. Thank
you for joining us Jackie! 

[Jackie Nowicki:] It's my pleasure, Holly.

[Holly Hobbs:] So Jackie, let's start with a basic question--who is
responsible for monitoring and testing water in child care facilities? 

[Jackie Nowicki:] Well, it's a great question and the answer is a little
bit complicated. So, child care providers care for millions of young
children every day. But there's no federal law for requiring child care
facilities to test their water for lead. And that's true even for child
care facilities that are subsidized with federal funds, like Head Start
centers. Some states and cities do require testing and--although there
are some exceptions--in general it is the child care providers
themselves who are responsible for arranging to take water samples and
get those samples tested, and pay for it all. So if they have to replace
or repair a faucet or anything in their plumbing system, that can cost
some serious money. And that can be a significant concern, particularly
for small providers. 

[Holly Hobbs:] So, what do we know about testing rates and outcomes?

[Jackie Nowicki:] So, for this part of our work, we focused on Head
Start programs. These programs enrolled about a million kids--infants
through 5 years old--nationwide last year. So, to collect our data we
conducted a nationally generalizable survey. And what we found is
that--in the 12 months prior to our survey, only about one quarter of
Head Start centers nationwide tested their drinking water for lead, and
about 43 percent didn't test, and about one-third did not know if they
had tested their drinking water. Now, the does-not-know piece can be a
little tricky, but sometimes Head Start centers don't know if they have
tested because they might be located in a building like a school. So the
Head Start program isn't the party responsible for the testing. The good
news is, is that we know that most centers who did test did not find
lead in their drinking water. And we know that those that did find lead
reported taking steps to fix it. 

[Music]

[Holly Hobbs:] So, it sounds like there are concerns about the safety of
drinking water in child care facilities, and that--at least for
federally-funded Head Start facilities--there is some testing going on.
But, even so, a high number of facilities have not had their water
tested. 
So Jackie, did we make any recommendations to improve the monitoring of
water quality?

[Jackie Nowicki:] We made several recommendations intended to help
reduce lead in drinking water in Head Start programs and in other child
care centers' drinking water too. Maybe most importantly, we recommended
that the Department of Health and Human Services require Head Start to
programs provide documentation that shows that their drinking water has
been tested for lead and is safe to drink. The reason we did that is
because right now the Office of Head Start requires its programs to
provide safe drinking water to children, but it has no way of knowing if
this is happening or not. So, for example, they don't require their Head
Start centers to test their water, or to document that it's safe from
lead, and they don't check that centers are complying with that standard
when they go out and monitor these programs. 

[Holly Hobbs:] And Jackie, last question: What's the bottom line of your
report?

[Jackie Nowicki:] We know that young children are particularly at risk
of experiencing adverse effects of lead exposure, and there's no federal
law requiring lead testing in most child care facilities; and most
states don't require it either. And even in Head Start centers where we
have really good, really recent data on testing, we know that most
centers either didn't test for lead in their water or they didn't know
if they tested even though they are supposed to provide safe drinking
water to kids. The good news is, is that HHS agreed with the
recommendations we made. So ultimately, they should reduce the risk of
young children being exposed to lead in their drinking water.  

[Holly Hobbs:] That was Jackie Nowicki talking about GAO's recent report
on safety standards for lead in drinking water at child care facilities.
Thank you for your time Jackie! 

[Jackie Nowicki:] My pleasure, Holly.

[Holly Hobbs:] And thank you for listening to the Watchdog Report. To
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For more from the congressional watchdog, the U.S. Government
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