Water system
Kent City
EPA ID OH6701812 · Portage County · 29,662 people served · owned by a local government
Kent City treats its own water from Breakneck Creek Wellfield, Buried Valley Aquifer.
The system's record
- Aquifer
- Buried Valley Aquifer (Breakneck Creek wellfield)
- Active wells
- 5
- Serves
- 29,662 people · Portage County
- EPA ID
- OH6701812
About this area's water
Did you know
- Kent's tap water was named Best Tasting Municipality Water at the 1995 Berkeley Springs International Water Tasting, and Mayor Kathleen Chandler carried it onto the March 3 episode of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.
- Kent's water has earned six awards at Berkeley Springs since it first entered in 1995, including first-, second- and third-place honors, most recently fifth place in the municipal category in 2011.
- Kent sits on the Cuyahoga River but does not drink it — the city draws entirely from the Breakneck Creek Wellfield in a buried valley aquifer, and one well, No. 13, is a rock well tapping a water-bearing sandstone…
- The plant softens hard water aggressively: raw water hardness averaged 304 mg/l in 2025 and came out of the tap at 101 mg/l.
- Kent keeps an emergency pipe connection to the City of Ravenna that it typically uses only one or two days a year — 917,000 gallons over three days in 2023, and not a single gallon in 2025.
History5
- 1973Ohio EPA detail plan approval established chlorine storage for eighteen 1-ton cylinders on the loading dock next to the chlorine room — an arrangement still in use in 2025 and now cited by Ohio EPA…
- 1995Kent's tap water was named Best Tasting Municipality Water at the Berkeley Springs International Water Tasting, and Mayor Kathleen Chandler appeared with it on the March 3 episode of The Tonight Show…
- 2011Kent placed fifth in the municipal water category at Berkeley Springs, its sixth award from the competition since first entering in 1995.
- 2023Ohio EPA identified four significant deficiencies at the Kent water system on January 24, all still under corrective action; separately, water and sewer rates rose 9% in January 2023 with the city…
- 2025The first of two new wells was drilled and pump tested; plant valves (sludge, lagoon and a 24-inch filter drain) were replaced and in-line pH and chlorine probes were added to the treatment process.
Treatment & pressure
How it is treated
Groundwater is pumped from several wells close to the Water Plant in the 'Breakneck Creek Wellfield,' which taps the Buried Valley Aquifer; the exception is Well No. 13, a rock well tapping a water-bearing sandstone formation. Treatment at the City of Kent Water Treatment Plant includes softening…
Source: kentohio.govkentohio.gov
Water pressure
Not published. No psi figure appears in the 2023 or 2025 Consumer Confidence Reports or on the city's water distribution pages.
Source: kentohio.govkentohio.gov
What it costs
$6.26 per 1,000 gallons
Typical household bill about $31 a month for water.
CAUTION ON UNITS: Kent bills per 1,000 CUBIC FEET, not per 1,000 gallons. The January 2023 rate ordinance set water at $46.83 per 1,000 cubic feet (up 9% from $42.97) with a…
Source: yahoo.com
Water quality & impurities10
| Contaminant | Level | Limit | Year |
|---|---|---|---|
| Total Trihalomethanes (TTHM) Chlorination byproduct. Range 51.20-51.70. Consistently the highest-reading regulated contaminant in Kent's water. | 51.70 ppb | 80 | 2025 |
| Haloacetic Acids (HAA5) Chlorination byproduct. Range 8.74-12.90. | 12.90 ppb | 60 | 2025 |
| Total Chlorine Range 0.90-1.3. Water additive to control microbes. | 1.14 ppm | 4 (MRDL) | 2025 |
| Fluoride Range 0.74-1.07. Raw water averaged only 0.17 mg/l, so nearly all of this is added. | 1.03 ppm | 4 | 2025 |
| Nitrate Runoff from fertilizer, leaching from septic tanks and sewage, erosion of natural deposits. | 0.499 ppm | 10 | 2025 |
| Chromium Discharge from steel and pulp mills; erosion of natural deposits. | 2.71 ppb | 100 | 2025 |
| Nickel Reported by the utility as NA for MCL and MCLG. | 1.37 ppb | no MCL listed | 2025 |
| Bromodichloromethane Individual trihalomethane; regulated only within the 80 ppb TTHM total. | 5.48 ppb | no individual… | 2025 |
| Chloroform Individual trihalomethane. | 5.34 ppb | no individual… | 2025 |
| Dibromochloromethane Individual trihalomethane. | 5.07 ppb | no individual… | 2025 |
Source: kentohio.gov
EPA compliance record
Lead at the tap: 90th-percentile result 0 ppb in 2023 (action level 15 ppb).
EPA record: no health-based violations since 2015.
1 violation of any kind logged since 2020: 1 for a report, record or notice that was missing, late or incomplete (the yearly water quality report, a public notice, lead line records).
Projects & plans8
Recent and current work
- Wellfield rehabilitation of an existing well · 2023 · completed
Completed June 2023 to add redundancy while other wells undergo maintenance. No cost published. - Wellfield test drilling program · 2023 · completed
Test drillings completed in fall 2023 with favorable results; the city stated adding more wells to the raw water supply would be necessary in coming years. No… - First of two new production wells · 2025 · completed
Drilled and pump tested in 2025; expected to add significant redundancy to the Breakneck Creek Wellfield. No cost published. - Water treatment plant valve replacements and in-line probes · 2025 · completed
Sludge valves, lagoon valves and a 24-inch filter drain valve replaced; in-line pH probes and a chlorine probe added to the treatment process. No cost…
Source: kentohio.govkentohio.gov
Planned or needed
- Second new production well · 2026 · under construction
Being drilled in 2026 to complete the two-well redundancy program. No cost published. - 500,000-gallon pedisphere tank rehabilitation and painting · 2026 · under construction
Ohio EPA significant deficiency identified 1/24/2023 (unscreened venting, badly corroded access-tube ladder, poor interior and exterior coatings). Under… - 400,000-gallon ground storage tank rehabilitation and painting · 2026 · planned
Ohio EPA significant deficiency identified 1/24/2023 (anchor bolt nuts, internal overflow piping needing an external air-gap discharge, substantial interior… - Chlorine gas to liquid sodium hypochlorite conversion study · 2026 · planned
Ohio EPA flagged outdoor storage of 1-ton chlorine cylinders as an unacceptable risk to operators and the surrounding public. AECOM is under contract to…
Source: kentohio.gov
Supply stress
Ohio EPA's source water assessment rates Kent's supply as HIGHLY susceptible to contamination: the sand and gravel aquifer has a shallow depth to water of less than 15 feet, the topography is flat with loam and sandy-loam soils that let a moderate to significant share of precipitation infiltrate, no confining layer exists in many areas…
Source: kentohio.govyahoo.com
Sewers
Sanitary
The City of Kent's Water Reclamation Division operates its own Water Reclamation Facility handling residential, commercial and industrial wastewater. Design capacity is 5 MGD with a peak hydraulic capacity of 15 MGD. Treatment is built around chemical removal of phosphorus and biological removal of ammonia along with conventional…
Source: kentohio.orgkentohio.gov
Sourcesverified
Compiled from the utility's own reports and public records, then independently re-checked against primary sources.
Main supplier in 2 ZIP codes
Serves
Main water supplier in 2 ZIP codes
- 44243 · Kent100% of residents
- 44240 · Kent65% of residents
Population-weighted resident shares; a ZIP code can have more than one system on record. Recomputed from each ZIP's own system list, not from the map's cached footprint.
Buys from · Sells to
Kent City does not buy water from another system on record; it treats its own source water.
No other system is on record buying water from Kent City.
What the records show about Kent City
Who runs it
EPA's record describes Kent City as owned by a local government. It has 6,609 service connections and serves 29,662 people.
EPA classes it as a community water system, one that serves the same residents all year.
Its office telephone on EPA's record is 330-676-7221.
Source: EPA Safe Drinking Water Information System (SDWIS), water system record.
How the water is treated
EPA's treatment table registers these steps for Kent City: coagulation and settling, chlorine disinfection, fluoridation, lime softening, and sand or media filtration.
The list is what each system registered with EPA for treatment plants EPA still shows as active, and it can lag a plant upgrade.
Source: EPA Safe Drinking Water Information System (SDWIS) treatment table (EPA Envirofacts, pulled September 2026).
Violations
EPA's record shows no health-based violations for Kent City since 2015.
EPA logs 1 violation of any kind since 2020: 1 for a report, record or notice that was missing, late or incomplete (the yearly water quality report, a public notice, lead line records).
Source: EPA Safe Drinking Water Information System (SDWIS) violation records: health-based violations with compliance periods beginning in 2015 or later, all violations from 2020 or later (EPA Envirofacts, pulled September 2026).
Lead and copper at the tap
In the sampling period ending December 2023, the 90th-percentile lead result at Kent City was 0 ppb, under both the current 15 ppb action level and the 10 ppb level that applies from 2027. A result of 0 means at least nine in ten of the homes sampled had no lead detected.
EPA has 3 sampling periods on file for Kent City since 2016, the first ending in 2017; no period was above 10 ppb.
Every water system has to inventory its service lines, the pipes from the main to each building. In the inventory Kent City sent EPA, 6,664 lines are counted.
| Material | Lines |
|---|---|
| Lead | 1 |
| Galvanized, needing replacement | 64 |
| Unknown material | 2,508 |
| Not lead | 4,091 |
| All lines | 6,664 |
Systems sample taps in the homes most likely to have lead pipes or solder. The 90th-percentile result is the level nine in ten of the sampled homes were at or below. Lead comes mostly from service lines and house plumbing, not the source water, so a low result for the system does not clear an old house.
EPA's dashboard status for this inventory: reported all required service line types.
Source: EPA Safe Drinking Water Information System (SDWIS) lead and copper 90th-percentile results (EPA Envirofacts), sampling periods ending 2016 or later; EPA's service line inventory dashboard, Ohio's 2026 Q2 submission.
PFAS
EPA's fifth national round of testing (UCMR 5) took 2 samples of the water entering the pipes of Kent City in 2025 and measured 29 PFAS. No PFAS was detected, PFOA and PFOS (federal limit 4 ng/L each) among them.
Ohio EPA's own statewide sampling tested 1 plant of Kent City (latest sample September 2020). Not one of the six PFAS tested (PFOA, PFOS, PFHxS, PFNA, GenX and PFBS) was detected.
Ohio EPA's current sampling status map lists 1 plant of Kent City as sampled, most recently April 2026.
PFAS are the 'forever chemicals' from firefighting foam, plating shops and non-stick coatings. Results are for water leaving the plant, not your tap.
Source: EPA UCMR 5 occurrence data (final release, August 2026); Ohio EPA statewide PFAS sampling, 2019 to 2021, and its sampling status map.
Disinfection byproducts
Chlorine that disinfects water also reacts with organic matter to form byproducts. Two groups have federal limits: total trihalomethanes (TTHM, 80 µg/L) and five haloacetic acids (HAA5, 60 µg/L), judged on running yearly averages at each sampling site.
For TTHM, the average of Kent City's samples in 2019, the last year it was sampled, was 56.4 µg/L. The worst yearly average was 74.4 µg/L and the highest single sample was 99.2 µg/L, from 118 samples taken from 2012 to 2019.
For HAA5, the average in the last year sampled was 10.4 µg/L. The worst yearly average was 13 µg/L and the highest single sample was 16.1 µg/L, from 116 samples.
| Byproduct | Limit | Latest yearly average | Worst yearly average | Highest sample | Samples |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| TTHM | 80 µg/L | 56.4 µg/L (2019) | 74.4 µg/L | 99.2 µg/L | 118 |
| HAA5 | 60 µg/L | 10.4 µg/L | 13 µg/L | 16.1 µg/L | 116 |
A yearly average of 0 means nothing was detected in that year's samples. EPA's file stops at 2019; Ohio EPA's Drinking Water Watch has newer results.
Source: EPA Six-Year Review 4 compliance monitoring data, 2012 to 2019, distribution-system samples (non-detects counted as zero).
Nitrate, arsenic and radioactivity
Nitrate was not detected in 8 samples through 2019 (limit 10 mg/L as nitrogen; above 10 is unsafe for infants).
Arsenic was not detected in 3 samples (limit 10 µg/L).
| Contaminant | Samples | Highest result | Limit | Samples over limit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nitrate (as nitrogen) | 8 | not detected | 10 mg/L | 0 |
| Arsenic | 3 | not detected | 10 µg/L | 0 |
Measured in finished water: at the plant's entry points and in the distribution system; raw well and intake samples are left out. Non-detects count as zero.
Source: EPA Six-Year Review 4 compliance monitoring data, 2012 to 2019, finished water.
Solvents and fuels
EPA's file holds results for all six solvent and fuel compounds it checked. Benzene, carbon tetrachloride, 1,2-dichloroethane, trichloroethylene, tetrachloroethylene, and vinyl chloride were not detected in 3 samples each.
| Compound | Limit | Samples | Detected in | Highest result | Samples over limit |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Benzene | 5 µg/L | 3 | 0 of 3 | not detected | 0 |
| Carbon tetrachloride | 5 µg/L | 3 | 0 of 3 | not detected | 0 |
| 1,2-dichloroethane | 5 µg/L | 3 | 0 of 3 | not detected | 0 |
| Trichloroethylene (TCE) | 5 µg/L | 3 | 0 of 3 | not detected | 0 |
| Tetrachloroethylene (PCE) | 5 µg/L | 3 | 0 of 3 | not detected | 0 |
| Vinyl chloride | 2 µg/L | 3 | 0 of 3 | not detected | 0 |
"Not detected" means the lab's result was below what its method can measure, not that the compound is absent. Non-detects count as zero in the highest-result column.
Source: EPA Six-Year Review 4 compliance monitoring data, 2012 to 2019, finished water.
Farm chemicals and metals
EPA's file holds results for 8 of the nine herbicides and metals it checked. Not detected: atrazine in 2 samples, alachlor in 2 samples, chromium in 3 samples, cadmium in 3 samples, barium in 3 samples, mercury in 3 samples, selenium in 3 samples, thallium in 3 samples.
| Substance | Kind | Limit | Samples | Detected in | Highest result | Samples over limit |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Atrazine | Farm chemical | 3 µg/L | 2 | 0 of 2 | not detected | 0 |
| Alachlor | Farm chemical | 2 µg/L | 2 | 0 of 2 | not detected | 0 |
| Chromium | Metal | 100 µg/L | 3 | 0 of 3 | not detected | 0 |
| Cadmium | Metal | 5 µg/L | 3 | 0 of 3 | not detected | 0 |
| Barium | Metal | 2,000 µg/L | 3 | 0 of 3 | not detected | 0 |
| Mercury | Metal | 2 µg/L | 3 | 0 of 3 | not detected | 0 |
| Selenium | Metal | 50 µg/L | 3 | 0 of 3 | not detected | 0 |
| Thallium | Metal | 2 µg/L | 3 | 0 of 3 | not detected | 0 |
Non-detects count as zero in the highest-result column.
Source: EPA Six-Year Review 4 compliance monitoring data, 2012 to 2019, finished water.
Bacteria in the pipes
From 2012 to 2019, 0 of 3,614 routine total coliform samples taken in the distribution system at Kent City tested positive (0%); in 2019, the last year on file, 0 of 385 did.
A positive coliform test is a warning sign, not a violation by itself. E. coli is a sign that human or animal waste may have reached the water. Coliform counts are routine samples only; E. coli counts include repeat samples.
Source: EPA Six-Year Review 4 compliance monitoring data, 2012 to 2019, distribution-system presence/absence tests for total coliform and E. coli.
Fluoride
The Ohio Department of Health's report to the CDC (My Water's Fluoride) says Kent City adjusts the fluoride level to the recommended level for preventing tooth decay.
EPA's treatment table lists fluoridation among the steps at Kent City.
Measured fluoride: 0.98 mg/L on average at the plant's entry points in 2019 (in the range dentists aim for); samples ran from 0.93 to 0.98 mg/L across 3 samples in 2012 to 2019.
The recommended level for preventing tooth decay is 0.7 mg/L; the federal limit is 4 mg/L. The treatment list is what each system registered with EPA and can lag a plant upgrade.
Source: CDC My Water's Fluoride (fluoridation status as reported by the Ohio Department of Health, fetched September 2026); EPA Safe Drinking Water Information System (SDWIS) treatment table; EPA Six-Year Review 4 compliance monitoring data, 2012 to 2019, entry-point fluoride samples.
Lithium
Lithium was not detected in 2 UCMR 5 samples at Kent City, last sampled in 2025 (the method reports from 9 µg/L).
Lithium is not regulated. EPA's draft health reference level is 10 µg/L, and it occurs naturally in deep groundwater, so well systems in the northwest run highest.
Source: EPA UCMR 5 occurrence data (final release, August 2026), samples from 2023 to 2025.
Water and sewer bills
Ohio EPA's 2023 rate survey puts the water bill at Kent City for a household using 5,000 gallons a month at $376 a year, about $31 a month.
The sewer bill in the same survey is $527 a year at 5,000 gallons a month.
| Use | Water, per year | Sewer, per year |
|---|---|---|
| 2,500 gallons a month | $188 | $264 |
| 5,000 gallons a month | $376 | $527 |
| 8,000 gallons a month | $601 | $844 |
The survey lists it as “Kent”. These are inside-city rates and annual bills at the use shown.
Source: Ohio EPA 2023 Sewer and Water Rate Survey (Ohio State University, May 2025).
How well the service area is mapped
EPA estimated the service area of Kent City with a computer model rather than drawing it from the utility's map, so its edges are approximate.
Counting the people who live in the ZIP codes it overlaps, this atlas estimates 30,646 residents are inside the boundary, 103% of the 29,662 people Kent City reports serving.
The resident count is an estimate from 2020 Census ZIP-code populations, not a count of customers.
Source: EPA Service Area Boundaries; resident estimate by this atlas from ZIP-code overlap.
Photograph
On the map
Show this system's territory on the map — 2 ZIP codes in all.
Sources
U.S. EPA SDWIS and Community Water System Service Area Boundaries (v3, 2026), Ohio EPA primacy data, 2020 census blocks: the system serving most residents, traced through purchases to the treating utility; Ohio EPA 2023 Sewer and Water Rate Survey (Ohio State, May 2025) for household bills; Ohio EPA DEFA loan awards since 2016 for the loans paragraph · EPA SDWIS · EPA service area boundaries · Ohio EPA drinking water · Ohio EPA rate survey
EPA's own record for this system: Enforcement and Compliance History report for OH6701812 (EPA ECHO).
Kent City's own pages: kentohio.gov
Notable facts: kentohio.gov, patch.com, en.wikipedia.org
History: kentohio.gov, kentohio.gov, patch.com, yahoo.com
Water quality: kentohio.gov
Planned work: kentohio.gov
Water pressure: kentohio.gov, kentohio.gov
Capital projects: kentohio.gov, kentohio.gov
Rates: yahoo.com
Sewers: kentohio.org, kentohio.gov
Treatment: kentohio.gov, kentohio.gov
Supply stress: kentohio.gov, yahoo.com
