Welcome To The City Of Muskegon Heights

MUSKEGON HEIGHTS

DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC UTILITIES

Annual Drinking Water Quality Report

2005

We are pleased to present you with the 2005 Annual Drinking Water Quality Report. This report is designed to inform you about the quality of the water delivered to you every day. Our constant goal is to provide you with a safe and dependable supply of drinking water. We want you to understand the efforts we make to continually improve the water treatment process and protect our water resources. We are committed to ensuring the quality of your water. Our water source is one of the highest quality surface water sources in the world, Lake Michigan.

This report is designed to give you detailed information, which will insure you just how good your drinking water really is.

If you have any questions about this report or concerning your water utility, please contact your Director of Public Utilities, at 780-3415. We want our valued customers to be informed about their water utility. If you want to learn more, please attend any of our regularly scheduled City Council meetings. They are held on the second and fourth Monday of each month, at 5:30pm in the City Council chambers at 2724 Peck Street, Muskegon Heights, Michigan.

The City of Muskegon Heights routinely monitors for contaminants in your drinking water according to, and in excess of, Federal and State laws. The following table shows the results of our monitoring for the period of January 1, 2005, through December 31, 2005. All drinking water, including bottled drinking water, may be reasonably expected to contain at least small amounts of some contaminants. It's important to remember that the presence of these contaminants does not necessarily pose a health risk. It is just as important to understand that a contaminant, as defined in this report, includes natural elements and compounds as well as the man made compounds manufactured every day, many of which we all use in our daily activities. Even distilled water is not “pure” water because distilled water does have very small quantities of “contaminants”.

Click Here To View Water Quality Data Table

In the following tables you will find many terms and abbreviations you might not be familiar with. To help you better understand these terms we've provided the following definitions:

Not-Detected (ND) - laboratory analysis indicates that the contaminant is not present.

Parts per million (ppm) or Milligrams per liter (mg/l) - one part per million corresponds to one minute in two years or a single penny in $10,000.

Parts per billion (ppb) or Micrograms per liter - one part per billion corresponds to one minute in 2,000 years, or a single penny in $10,000,000.

Nephelometric Turbidity Unit (NTU) - nephelometric turbidity unit is a measure of the clarity of water. Turbidity in excess of 5 NTU is just noticeable to the average person.

Action Level - the concentration of a contaminant, which, if exceeded, triggers treatment or other requirements, which a water system must follow.

Treatment Technique (TT) - A treatment technique is a required process intended to reduce the level of a contaminant in drinking water.

Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL): The highest level of a contaminant that is allowed in drinking water. MCLs are set as close to the MCLGs as feasible using the best available treatment technology.

Maximum Contaminant Level Goal - The “Goal”(MCLG) is the level of a contaminant in drinking water below which there is no known or expected risk to health. MCLGs allow for a margin of safety.

Maximum residual disinfectant level goal or “MRDLG” means the level of a drinking water disinfectant below which there is no known or expected risk to health. MRDLGs do not reflect the benefits of the use of disinfectants to control microbial contaminants.

Maximum residual disinfectant level or “MRDL” means the highest level of a disinfectant allowed in drinking water. There is convincing evidence that addition of a disinfectant is necessary for control of microbial contaminants.

What does all this mean?

Our system had no violations. We're proud that your drinking water meets or exceeds all Federal and State requirements. We have learned through our monitoring and testing that some contaminants have been detected.

Thank you for allowing us to continue providing your family with clean, quality water this year.

Please call our office if you have questions.