All but one of greater Geelong’s public water fountains will reopen after a lead-contamination scare shut them down earlier this year, City Hall has announced.
Department of Health and Human Services had cleared 166 of the council-owned fountains, the City said.
“The sole drinking fountain to be closed is located at Aldershot Reserve in St Albans Park, which showed levels of potential concern to health if large amounts of water were regularly consumed.
“The department advised that people do not need to be concerned if they have consumed water from the City’s fountains, as drinking water fountains are not a primary source of drinking water.”
The fountains would begin flowing again this month, the City said.
“This will involve a process of reconnecting water supply and flushing each fountain for a period of five minutes.
“It’s important to note that water supplied by Barwon Water is completely safe to drink. This (was) not an issue related to the quality of water supplied by Barwon Water but with the public drinking fountain infrastructure.”
City Hall advised users to flush public fountains for 30 seconds before drinking to draw fresh water to the outlet.
“We want to assure the community that they should feel confident that an extremely thorough investigation process has been followed, and they can resume drinking from the City’s public drinking fountains safely,” said City Hall’s Joanne Van Slageren.
