Cheatham Annex, VA
Lead detected, under the action levels
Latest 90th-percentile lead: 1 ppb (monitoring period 2023-2025). The federal action level is 15 ppb today and drops to 10 ppb in Nov 2027; EPA's health goal is 0. Lead was measured in sampled homes but the 90th percentile is under both action levels. EPA's health goal for lead is zero, so test your own tap if your home was built before 1986 or anyone in it is pregnant or a young child.
About Cheatham Annex
Cheatham Annex serves about 632 people through 145 service connections, which makes it a small system under EPA's size classes. It is federally owned and draws surface water, in York County, Virginia. EPA system ID: VA3199210; phone on file: 757-887-4808. They can tell you what your service line is made of and whether they pay to replace it.
Cheatham Annex's lead record
That is down 3 ppb from 4 ppb in the period ending 2022. The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Cheatham Annex is 7 ppb across 4 monitoring periods, none of them over 15 ppb.
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2025 | 1 ppb |
| 2022 | 4 ppb |
| 2019 | 2 ppb |
| 2016 | 7 ppb |
Against other Virginia systems
Of the 996 Virginia systems with a lead result, the median latest reading is 0 ppb; 3 are over 15 ppb right now and 59 have gone over at some point. Cheatham Annex's 1 ppb sits at the 59th percentile in Virginia and the 53rd nationally (higher means more lead).
Nearby utilities
6 other systems share York County; 2 of them have a higher latest lead result than Cheatham Annex. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| Yorktown Naval Weapons Station | 2,386 | 0 (not detected) |
| Lightfoot System | 1,950 | 0 (not detected) |
| Queens Lake System | 1,375 | 4.58 ppb |
| York Terrace System | 755 | 1.56 ppb |
| Nelson Park | 530 | 0 (not detected) |
| Carver Gardens | 163 | 0 (not detected) |
What to do in your house
Test your own tap with a certified lab first-draw sample; Yorktown, VA may offer free or low-cost kits through the utility. If your own line is lead, replacing the private side runs about $1,200-$12,300 (EPA average about $4,700). Ask Cheatham Annex whether it covers that cost before hiring anyone - many utilities now do.
These figures describe homes the utility sampled, not your tap. Only your service line record or a test of your own water answers the question for your house. What a 90th-percentile result does and does not tell you: how to read a lead result. Size matters more than most people expect: small vs large water systems.