In 2011, the City of Moose Jaw released a report saying 2670 households "may have lead present in their service connections or plumbing systems."

That number is slowly getting whittled down.

"The estimate (now) is (between) 2000-2200 homes would (still) have a lead service connection," said Director of Engineering Josh Mickleborough. 

One of those homes belongs to Greg Myers, who has lived in his Redland Avenue home for about 30 years.  His water was part of annual random testing done by the city in January.  Health Canada guidelines, used by the City of Moose Jaw, say that the "allowable" lead level in water, can be up to 10 pg/l (picograms per litre).

"I just received test results from my water," said Myers, referring to a letter dated May 31. "Mine has 29.6 (pg/l)..almost 3 times what is acceptable."

According to Health Canada, lead poisoning could lead to biochemical and neurobehavioural effects (intellectual development, behaviour) in infants and young children (under 6 years), in addition to affecting the central nervous system and causing anemia.

Myers says he and his family do not have any health issues related to the lead, but admitted that once the test results came back and he read the potential side effects, he was concerned.

"I've got three grandsons, and I have them coming around quite a bit..I was concerned, not only for our health but more for theirs."

Myers doesn't think the lead is coming from his property, saying "my pipes inside the house were changed in the mid-80s, and then early 90s the pipe to the city connection was changed to copper."

Myers did allow for the possibility that lead from the soldering used on the copper pipe could be a contributing factor to the volume of lead in his water, but that won't be known until the city investigates the issue.

"We want to verify what the material is on the property, and what the material for the connection is on the street," explained Mickleborough, who said they will meet with Myers within "the next two weeks" to figure out exactly what the contributing factors to the excess lead levels are.

In the meantime, Myers is left with a few choices to avoid drinking potentially unsafe water.

"Every time your water lines are idle for 6 hours or more they say to run your taps for 10 minutes until the water comes out cold so you know the (lead) has run through the system. That could get expensive if you start doing that twice a day, every day, all year round.  I think it might be cheaper to go get a water cooler (and) bottled water."

Replacing lead lines is also a part of the city's cast iron water main replacement program, with many lead service connections being replaced at the same time as the cast iron pipes.

Residents slated for cast iron replacement could save about $1650 if they have a relatively new water connection already on their property, but if it's an old lead line there is no choice but to have the work done since the lead is a health concern.

"Cast iron water mains were installed in the period when lead service connections were used," explained Mickleborough. "We want to address both of those issues in a planned and systematic way with the implementation of the cast iron replacement program."

Mickleborough says the city randomly tests water from about 30 homeowners suspected to have lead service connections each year.