Dequeen Water Work, AR
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.
Who runs the water here
Dequeen Water Work serves about 6,105 people through 2,340 service connections, which makes it a medium-sized system under EPA's size classes. It is owned by a local government (city, town, county or district) and draws surface water, in Sevier County, Arkansas. EPA system ID: AR0000520; phone on file: 870-584-3445. Ask them for your address in their service line inventory - every system had to publish one by Oct 2024.
Dequeen Water Work's lead record
Against the period ending 2023 (1 ppb) the latest result is about the same. The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Dequeen Water Work is 6 ppb across 8 monitoring periods, none of them over 15 ppb.
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2025 | 1 ppb |
| 2023 | 1 ppb |
| 2022 | 2 ppb |
| 2021 | 1 ppb |
| 2020 | 1 ppb |
| 2020 | 6 ppb |
| 2019 | 4 ppb |
| 2016 | 6 ppb |
Against other Arkansas systems
Of the 190 Arkansas systems with a lead result, the median latest reading is 1 ppb; 15 are over 15 ppb right now and 19 have gone over at some point. Dequeen Water Work's 1 ppb sits at the 28th percentile in Arkansas and the 55th nationally (higher means more lead).
Neighbouring systems
4 other systems share Sevier County; 0 of them have a higher latest lead result than Dequeen Water Work. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| Horatio Waterworks | 1,278 | - |
| Lockesburg Waterworks | 739 | - |
| Gillham Waterworks | 255 | - |
| Ben Lomond Waterworks | 210 | - |
Your move
Test your own tap with a certified lab first-draw sample; Dequeen, AR 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 Dequeen Water Work whether it covers that cost before hiring anyone - many utilities now do. Its latest copper 90th percentile is 1460 ppb (copper action level 1,300 ppb).
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. Systems that went over once often dip back under; here is what that means.