Louisiana residents can now get a simple answer to questions about the quality of their water system.
Our media partners at The Advocate posted an in-depth look at the Louisiana Department of Health’s new grading system for community water systems.
The system gave an "F' to 64 systems, and 66 systems earned D grades, the newspaper reports. Those 130 systems supply water to 450,000 residents, according to LDH data.
According to The Advocate, these preliminary grades, published Jan. 1, are assigned to the 954 community water systems In Louisiana. The vast majority of the grades were good: 776 of the 954 water systems graded, covering some 3.9 million people, earned an A or B, according to LDH’s data.
Most major cities — including New Orleans, Baton Rouge, Lafayette, Shreveport — had water systems that received at least a C. But Jefferson Parish’s west bank water system, which serves about 160,000 customers, received a D. It was the largest system to receive a failing grade, the newspaper reports.
The water systems were graded in a number of weighted categories, including water quality violations, infrastructure and operations and maintenance. A failing grade, LDH notes, does not mean the water is unsafe. Rather, it indicates the system may not be viable long-term, the newspaper reports.
To read The Advocate's full story, click here.
To find your system's grade, click here and scroll down a bit until you see the map of the state. Then click on your parish, and when the list of systems pops up, click on your system.
Here are the pages for each Acadiana parish:
Acadia
Calcasieu
Evangeline
Iberia
Jeff Davis
Lafayette
St. Landry
St. Martin
St. Mary
Vermilion
