East Palestine Village

• The five village wells are only 50 to 100 feet deep and tap an alluvial sand-and-gravel aquifer flowing in from the northwest; they pumped 118.1 million gallons in 2025.
• The granular activated carbon filters that now polish the town's drinking water were bought by Norfolk Southern after the 2023 derailment and sit in a purpose-built 101-by-42-foot building; they went into service on…
• East Palestine's trihalomethane level, 4.57 ppb against an 80 ppb limit, is unusually low for a chlorinated system, a side effect of drawing clean groundwater and polishing it through carbon.
• The village was a city from 1920 until 2011, when the 2010 census put it below 5,000 people and it reverted to village status.
• Ohio EPA's 2019 source water assessment flagged the wellfield as highly susceptible to contamination for lack of a clay cap, four years before the derailment gave that finding a much larger audience.

Source: eastpalestine-oh.govreviewonline.comen.wikipedia.org

• 1828Platted by Thomas McCalla and William Grate as Mechanicsburg.
• 1833Renamed East Palestine, after the region of Palestine.
• 1875Incorporated as East Palestine.
• 1880-1980sA pottery started in 1880 became the W.S. George Pottery Company in 1904; the plant operated into the 1980s.
• 1920Reclassified from village to city.
• 2011Reclassified back to a village after population fell below 5,000 (2010 census: 4,721).

Source: en.wikipedia.orgeastpalestine-oh.govnorfolksouthern.com

How it is treated

Village-owned groundwater plant on five wells, 50 to 100 feet deep, drawing from an alluvial sand-and-gravel aquifer that flows in from the northwest. Raw water passes through four pressure filters (SDWIS records them as greensand, with permanganate feed) to remove iron and manganese, then through…

Source: eastpalestine-oh.govdata.epa.govdata.epa.gov

Water pressure

Not published. No distribution pressure figure or pressure-zone map appears in the CCR, the village utilities page, or any Ohio EPA document located.

$4.35 per 1,000 gallons

Typical household bill about $44 a month for water.

Ordinance 7-2026, adopted April 13, 2026, effective June 1, 2026: water minimum charge $31.09 covering the first 1,000 gallons, then $4.35 per additional 1,000 gallons. Customers…

Source: eastpalestine-oh.govmorningjournalnews.com

Source: eastpalestine-oh.gov

EPA compliance record

Lead at the tap: 90th-percentile result 2.9 ppb in 2023 (action level 15 ppb).

EPA record: no health-based violations since 2015.

1 violation of any kind logged since 2020, 1 of them paperwork (monitoring, reporting, public notice or consumer report).

Recent and current work

• Granular activated carbon (GAC) filtration system and housing building · $661,481 · 2024 · completed
  Calgon GAC units in a 101 ft by 42 ft structure, placed into service June 20, 2024; paid for by Norfolk Southern as part of its post-derailment grant. Added as…
• Norfolk Southern drinking-water system grant · $4.3 million · 2023 · completed
  Announced September 14, 2023: $661,481 already reimbursed for carbon filters and initial engineering, plus $3.638 million for further engineering, filtration…
• System-wide leak detection survey · 2026 · completed
  Completed ahead of the 2026 rate ordinance; cited by the village as part of the case for the increase. No cost published.
• Sentinel monitoring well network · 2023 · completed
  More than 20 monitoring wells placed between the derailment site and the wellfield, sampled to screen for derailment-related chemicals. No derailment-related…

Source: norfolksouthern.comreviewonline.comeastpalestine-oh.gov

Planned or needed

• Remaining Norfolk Southern grant work (engineering, filtration technology, infrastructure) · $3.6 million · 2023 · planned
  Balance of the $4.299 million grant beyond the completed GAC filters; Norfolk Southern said it would keep discussing with the village whether further work is…

Source: norfolksouthern.com

The 2019 source water assessment rates the wellfield highly susceptible to contamination because there is no protective clay layer over the shallow alluvial aquifer; named potential sources are cropland and pasture (nutrients, ammonia, pesticides), poorly maintained septic systems, fertilizers, herbicides and underground storage tanks.…

Source: eastpalestine-oh.govepa.govreviewonline.com

Sanitary

The village runs its own wastewater treatment plant (East Palestine WWTP, Ohio NPDES permit 3PD00042*ND) alongside the water plant; the Water/Sewer Department maintains roughly 26-28 miles each of water and sewer main and employs eight people, with Scott Wolfe as superintendent and operator in charge. Sewer is billed separately from…

Storm

Not documented. No village or Ohio EPA source located says whether the storm sewers are separate or combined, and no published drainage or flooding study was found.

Source: eastpalestine-oh.goveastpalestine-oh.govmorningjournalnews.com

Compiled from the utility's own reports and public records, then independently re-checked against primary sources.