Although officials have been working for five months to find and remove the cause of tainted drinking water at the Wilmington Veterans Administration clinic, the most recent tests still showed elevated levels of copper.
The health department collected 26 samples from the building July 27, and four showed elevated levels of copper, said Dianne Harvell, environmental health director for the New Hanover County Health Department. The department was called in after the building’s owners challenged the Cape Fear Public Utility Authority’s jurisdiction in the matter.
While steps were taken to locate the cause of the blue-green water discovered in some taps in March, the problem is not yet solved, Harvell said. The tint is an indicator of dissolved copper, which tests confirmed.
“They need to figure out what’s going on inside that building,” Harvell said.
The health department has been dealing directly with the VA, as the occupant.
“They say the owner has had an engineer looking at it and they could not find a problem,” Harvell said, adding the building “certainly is not meeting the needs it was designed for right now.”
The VA has been providing bottled water for drinking, Harvell said.
The owner previously suggested the water problem was outside the building, but the public utility authority has done several tests of the water lines leading to the facility and those tests are coming back clean.
Harvell said the next step is to isolate the hot and cold water and test them separately — which is harder than it seems because of the efficiency-designed water system.
Mike P. Fortune, an attorney for the Wisconsin-based owner of the VA facility, Wilmington NCVA, said the issue has been frustrating. But the pertinent parties met last week and are continuing discussions, he said.
The investors have built and leased other VA facilities throughout the country and this is the first time there has been a problem, Fortune said, adding there may be some differences between federal drinking-water laws and local testing standards.
“There’s somewhat of a disconnect as to how the health department and the Cape Fear Public Utility Authority interpret it,” he said.
In addition, many parties have been involved — the health department, the Veterans Administration, the Cape Fear Public Utility Authority and the owners — making communication difficult, he said.
The VA mandates and buys the fixtures that go into the building, Fortune said. However, he insisted the owners are working to ensure the water in the VA clinic is in compliance with regulations.
The owner replaced some of the plumbing joints, hoping that would correct the problem.
“But we’re not there yet,” Harvell said.
Members of the VA clinic staff first reported the water problem to the public utility authority in mid-March, said utility spokesman Mike McGill. The utility issued a Do Not Use notice that is still in effect.
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