High Arsenic Levels Found in Many Leonard Drinking Wells

Clean drinking water is something many of us take for granted.

Filling up a glass of water from your sink is something many of us do every day without even thinking twice.

But in Leonard, that’s no longer the case.

A high level of arsenic has been found in a number of wells.

But with a little help from the state, they’re hoping that will soon change.

Duane Wadeson lives on a farm six miles southwest of Leonard.

He loves his house.

But he says after thirty years of mortgage payments it’s worth nothing. Why?

Well, he doesn’t have clean water.

And that’s something he learned not too long ago.

“I began to get high fevers, nausea, loss of hair, loss of smell, taste,” says Duane Wadeson of Leonard.

Doctors couldn’t figure it out.

Until a friend going through chemo said his symptoms sounded very similar.
 
“I put two and two together and I said when they’re putting poison into your system which is chemo so I called my doctor and asked him to check me for poisoning,” says Wadeson.
 
They found traces of arsenic.

The current standards for arsenic are ten parts per billion.

Duane’s water was 44, and that’s not the highest.
 
“I’ve seen numbers as high as 127 parts per billion,” says Cass and Rural Water District Manager, Jerry Blomeke.
 
Blomeke has been working with Duane to bring rural water to the homes of people in Leonard.
 
“It’s perfect timing because we are just working on an expansion of our existing water treatment plant,” says Blomeke.
 
This existing water plant served most residents in south west Cass County but if funding goes through this new water plant should go to residents in Leonard too.
 
Duane was just in Bismarck last Monday looking for help from lawmakers.
 
“To pass a law so this does not happen again,” says Wadeson.
 
 A commission has approved a 75% grant to get a distribution center, but it still needs an ok from the government.

If everything is approved, construction should start by summer.

Duane tells me he thinks the publicity from Flint may have helped in getting funding.