A major effort to replace dangerous lead pipes is underway in D.C. But not all the replacement work has gone smoothly – and some residents tell the News4 I-Team they’ve been left with costly repair bills they don’t think they should have to pay.
Since DC Water launched its Lead Free DC initiative in 2019, 7,000 new service lines have been installed. The goal is to replace another 35,000 service lines by 2037.
Michael and Brooke Taylor are proud of the work they put into renovating their basement apartment in Southeast D.C.
"This is not a big place – very small – but it's built just for us,” Michael Taylor said.
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In February, the couple returned home from a trip and found a flooded mess throughout the apartment. They said it happened after their landlord agreed to let DC Water replace the lead pipes leading to the home while they were gone. They initially weren’t sure where to turn.
“Doing the research, trying to figure out, well, who do I call? Who do I talk to? How do I make a claim?” Brooke Taylor recalled asking.
She said DC Water's contractor returned and fixed the pipe that burst, but later that same day, she said another leak flooded the bathroom.
Video they provided shows soggy floorboards and water pouring from a pipe right onto the bathroom floor.
"So, now it’s like damage on top of damage. And at that point, DC Water never returned. None of the DC Water employees returned," Brooke Taylor said.
The Taylors got an estimate for the damage to the apartment and their property totaling about $30,000. They filed a claim to DC Water’s insurance, which started months of going back and forth to see who would pay for what. The insurer told them they suspected the flooding occurred because of faulty plastic tubing on a sink.
“While this may have been a residual effect of added water pressure due to your service line being replaced, this presents a question of fact as to whether or not the subcontractor was liable for negligent work,” a message from the insurer said.
Three months after the flooding, the Taylors were offered $8,000 by the insurer, which said: “This offer was made as a courtesy to assist with the cleanup and it not intended as an admission of liability. It has been our determination that the contractors were not negligent in their actions and there is no evidence that supports that they did do anything wrong.”
The insurer later added: “Sometimes accidents occur without the existence of legal liability.”
Since DC Water’s lead pipe replacement project started in 2019, the utility company has settled and paid more than $320,000 in damage claims, the I-Team found.
Southeast D.C. resident Andrew Interdonato said lead pipe replacement left him with expensive damage to his home.
In November 2022, he agreed to have lead pipes replaced in his 100-year-old house. Something went wrong after he said contractors plugged construction equipment into an outlet in his home instead of a generator, causing a power outage.
“The stove smelled like it was burning and there was smoke,” Interdonato said.
Documents provided to the I-Team by Interdonato show DC Water agreed to pay to get the power turned back, but only would pay for half of the costs to permanently fix the home’s electrical system, saying the repairs needed were not a direct result of the work the crew did.
“They chose to use my power. I suffered consequences. And they're just walking away, and that's not right," he said.
‘We’re going to make you whole’: How DC Water responded
DC Water said it couldn’t comment on individual cases that were in the claims process. Chief Communications Officer Kirsten Williams said, though: “In each one of those situations, it's something that we take very seriously.”
Williams said the number of customer complaints involving lead pipe replacement are small compared to the magnitude of the project, and that questions and complaints have dropped from 5% to just 1% this past fiscal year.
“If you look at the lead service line replacements nationally that are happening, these are standard instances that happen, especially when you look at the age and condition of some of the homes,” Williams said. “What I would tell those customers is that you have our commitment to know that we are going to go through this claims process with you. We're going to have our investigators come out, understand, and we're going to make you whole if we have been in error.”
When it comes to the frustration some DC Water customers experienced with back-and-forth about who is responsible for damage, Williams said: “You know, we go through a claims process, and that's where we rely on our partners who are in the insurance business.”
What an advocate says DC Water should change
There’s ample room for improvement, said Paul Schwartz, co-founder of the Campaign for Lead Free Water, a nonprofit that advocates for safe drinking water.
"We need DC Water and their customer service folks to be better trained and supported to deal with these real concerns that people have in our communities,” he said.
Schwartz said DC Water's program needs to improve customer relations, starting with making sure homeowners know their rights and what they might be responsible for before allowing work to be done on lead service lines.
"The contract that's going out in front of people right now is clearly written by lawyers, folks who have a hard time understanding it, and it tries to offload the liability and the concerns on the public,” Schwartz said. “That script needs to be flipped.”
Williams responded, saying, "We don't want this to be something where you feel like you're signing away your rights. We want you to understand why that is, and that's good feedback for us to take away that some of our customers are feeling as though the claims process may need some enhancements."
Williams said providing superior service is important to DC Water.
“What I want you to understand is that we are taking every effort to ensure that the incidents that have arisen are mitigated and don't happen again, and that you are our number one importance. Our customer is critically important to us,” she said.
Neither the Taylors nor Interdonato agreed to the claim settlement for partial payment, saying they didn’t want to sign the waiver the insurer required.
“We're not looking for payout – we’re looking for normalcy. And when we realized that wasn't going to happen, it just was a gut punch for us, honestly,” Michael Taylor said.
Interdonato said he’s grateful for his new waterline, which he said is working fine, but he’s still frustrated by the damage to his home.
“They're the ones who would get the credit if it was done well, and they should be the ones to get the blame for problems that occurred as a result of their own work,” he said.
If you have any questions or concerns involving the lead pipe replacement program, call DC Water's lead service hotline at 202-787-4044 or email lead@dcwater.com. Residents can file complaints to the Office of the People’s Counsel.
Reported by Tracee Wilkins, produced by Rick Yarborough, shot and edited by Jeff Piper
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