About GTLO
The Get the Lead Out (GTLO) of Iowans’ drinking water program is an ongoing statewide drinking water testing program to let at risk Iowans find out how much lead is in their drinking water. Dr. Drew Latta is the GTLO Program Director.
The program was created when we noticed the shortcomings of the limited and inadequate water testing required by the Lead and Copper Rule (LCR).
There are 1,075 community water systems in Iowa serving 2.8 million people.
Community water systems in Iowa annually sample about 0.5% of the 1.15 million households on public water as part of LCR compliance (Grant et al., 2020)
As of December 2019, there are 166,607 LCR water lead level measurements in Iowa from the last 29 years.
Lead Copper Rule water compliance sampling in Iowa
To make water testing more widely available for Iowan’s, the GTLO program offers water testing at no cost to the residents.
Three campaigns have tested 622 homes so far, and the program is now open year round to residences that are at high risk of elevated lead in their drinking water.
We also perform lead testing on private wells in Iowa. Of the 839 wells that we have data on, 55 were collected by GTLO and 784 came from the Private Well Tracking System.
The GTLO initiative was created by Prof. Michelle Scherer, Dr. Drew Latta, Dr. Amina Grant, and Danielle Land at The University of Iowa. The program is housed in the Center for Health Effects of Environmental Contamination (CHEEC) at The University of Iowa and supported by IIHR-Hydroscience & Engineering, College of Engineering, and Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at University of Iowa. Support has also come from NSF, U.S. EPA, and U.S. HUD.
For more information, please contact us at get-the-lead-out@uiowa.edu.
