Dawson, IL
Exceeded the action level in the past
Latest 90th-percentile lead: reported as 0 (not detected) (monitoring period 2025-2025). The federal action level is 15 ppb today and drops to 10 ppb in Nov 2027; EPA's health goal is 0. The latest result is under the action level, but this system has gone over 15 ppb before. Lead comes from pipes, not the source water, so a home with a lead service line can still be exposed. Test your own tap.
About Dawson
Dawson serves about 2,375 people through 820 service connections, which makes it a small system under EPA's size classes. It is owned by a local government (city, town, county or district) and draws groundwater, in Sangamon County, Illinois. EPA system ID: IL1670400; phone on file: 217-364-5975. Ask them for your address in their service line inventory - every system had to publish one by Oct 2024.
Dawson's lead record
Against the period ending 2025 (0 ppb) the latest result is about the same. The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Dawson is 24.9 ppb across 10 monitoring periods, 1 of them over the 15 ppb action level.
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2025 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2025 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2024 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2024 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2023 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2022 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2022 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2021 | 24.9 ppb over 15 |
| 2020 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2016 | 0 (not detected) |
Where this result ranks
Of the 1,744 Illinois systems with a lead result, the median latest reading is 0 ppb; 22 are over 15 ppb right now and 152 have gone over at some point. Dawson's reported as 0 (not detected) sits at the 42nd percentile in Illinois and the 31st nationally (higher means more lead). Systems reporting 0 tie at the bottom, so the rank mostly reflects size among them.
Nearby utilities
32 other systems share Sangamon County; 4 of them have a higher latest lead result than Dawson. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| Springfield | 117,444 | 0 (not detected) |
| Chatham | 16,423 | 0 (not detected) |
| Curran-Gardner Township Pwd | 6,651 | 0 (not detected) |
| Williamsville | 6,198 | 0 (not detected) |
| Auburn | 4,574 | 0 (not detected) |
| Riverton | 4,279 | 2 ppb |
| Rochester | 3,856 | 0 (not detected) |
| Pawnee | 2,700 | 0 (not detected) |
| Jerome | 1,600 | 0 (not detected) |
| Pleasant Plains | 1,508 | 0 (not detected) |
Next steps for Dawson, IL
Test your own tap with a certified lab first-draw sample; Dawson, IL 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 Dawson 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. More in what a past exceedance means today.