City Hall water supply unsafe to drink after tests show high bacteria levels

Houston City Hall water supply was deemed unsafe to drink after tests show high bacteria levels, likely as a result of recent flooding. Click the gallery to see before and after Hurricane Harvey photos. Houston City Hall water supply was deemed unsafe to drink after tests show high bacteria levels, likely as a result of recent flooding. Click the gallery to see before and after Hurricane Harvey photos. Photo: Nick De La Torre, Staff Photo: Nick De La Torre, Staff Image 1 of / 44 Caption Close City Hall water supply unsafe to drink after tests show high bacteria levels 1 / 44 Back to Gallery

Water at Houston City Hall and the adjacent annex has been deemed unsafe to drink in what the city believes to be an isolated water quality problem, after tests showed samples from both buildings contained more bacteria than is federally allowed.

More than two thirds of the samples taken from City Hall last Friday had a higher concentration of coliform bacteria than the Environmental Protection Agency allows, and nearly three quarters of the samples taken from the annex showed elevated bacteria levels, a memo sent to all city employees Tuesday morning said.

These high bacterial concentrations may but do not necessarily pose a health threat, EPA regulations indicate.

Nevertheless, C.J. Messiah, Jr., director of the city's General Services Department, called the contamination "significant."

"Since previous testing in these buildings did not find widespread bacterial presence in the drinking water, it is likely that the bacterial contamination is the result of the flooding and subsequent contamination of the water system," he wrote.

The city believes the water quality problem is limited to City Hall and the annex, the only city buildings whose water is stored in underground tanks.

"This City Hall situation is an isolated incident," mayoral spokesman Alan Bernstein wrote in an email. "Our parking garage and basement were flooded during Harvey and damaged our pumps that help propel water through our water tanks. As a result of the flooding, our tanks were submerged in flood water, which may have caused flood water to enter the tank."

The city has replaced the buildings' water pumps and plans to chlorinate both water tanks this weekend before retesting the system Sunday. Employees will be provided bottled water in the interim.

This is the second time in a year Houston has faced water quality concerns at City Hall.

The city shut down all drinking fountains and ice machines at City Hall and the annex last November, after tests showed high levels of lead in the water.

Bernstein added that privately owned buildings that use storage tanks that flooded during Harvey may also want to test their systems for bacteria.