PILSEN — A Pilsen elementary school is one of a dozen Chicago Public Schools found to have elevated levels of lead in their water since citywide testing began last month.
At Perez Elementary School, 1241 W. 19th St., five samples tested above federal limits of 15 parts per billion, or .015 milligrams of lead per liter of water.
The results come as the district "is taking proactive steps to ensure that our children's drinking water is safe across all schools," CPS spokesman Michael Passman said. Any schools with samples above federal standards will have water shut off until the issue is addressed.
So far, 58 schools have received results of the lead testing, which has included 15,853 samples of water sources as of June 7. Of the 3,044 samples with results so far, 70 have shown actionable levels of lead, roughly 2 percent.
Test results haven't come back yet for hundreds more schools. Of those tested, one in every five schools tested positive for elevated levels of lead so far.
The tainted samples came mostly from drinking fountains, along with one kitchen sink and four other sinks, CPS said.
A full list of the 12 schools found to have elevated levels of lead is here.
Perez Elementary serves about 500 students in two buildings, the older built in 1890.
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