The Rural Community Assistance Partnership (RCAP) will receive $3.65 million for the mitigation of lead from drinking water and removal of lead pipes, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced recently.
RCAP was one of six recipients of more than $30 million in grant funding from the Water Infrastructure Improvements for the Nation (WIIN) Act, according to the EPA's Oct. 21 announcement. The $3.54 million grant and additional Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) funds "will help make rapid progress on the goal of addressing lead and removing lead pipes across the country," the announcement states.
EPA Region 7 Administrator Meg McCollister said in the announcement that “Region 7 is a rural region."
"(T)his grant to the Rural Community Assistance Partnership is an important way EPA is investing in reducing childhood lead exposure in Iowa, Kansas, Missouri and Nebraska,” McCollister said in the announcement.
“RCAP plays a key role in fostering the technical, managerial, and financial capacity for our nation’s small water systems,” Olga Morales-Pate, CEO of RCAP, said in the EPA report. “We are pleased to lead and coordinate this project to help small water systems, rural schools, and child care centers overcome systemic lead-related challenges, and we thank EPA for investing in our rural infrastructure and communities.”
Other projects to receive funding include Trenton, N.J., Fall River, Maine, and the Detroit, Mich. Water and Sewerage Dept. for National Priority Area 1 – Reduction of Lead Exposure in the Nation’s Drinking Water Systems through Infrastructure and Treatment Improvements; and the Hawaii Dept. of Health and the School District of Philadelphia for National Priority Area 2 – Reduction of Children’s Exposure to Lead in Drinking Water in Schools and Child Care Facilities, according to the report.
The EPA reports the selected projects will help disadvantaged communities and schools remove the sources of lead in their drinking water, the statement reports, and the projects advance the goals of both the Biden administration's Lead Pipe and Paint Action Plan, and its Justice40 Initiative to deliver 40% of benefits from specific federal investments to disadvantaged communities, according to the EPA.
"A pillar of our work at EPA is ensuring that every person in every community has safe drinking water," Radhika Fox, EPA Assistant Administrator for Water, said in the release. "The science on lead is settled - there is no safe level of exposure. This grand funding will help reduce exposure to lead in drinking water and should be used to support underserved communities that are most at risk for exposure."
