Maxwell Water System, NM
Above the federal action level
Latest 90th-percentile lead: 17 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. In the most recent monitoring period, more than 10% of the sampled homes measured above 15 ppb. Use a filter certified to NSF/ANSI 53 for lead for drinking and cooking now, and test your own tap.
Maxwell Water System at a glance
Maxwell Water System serves about 340 people through 157 service connections, which makes it a very small system under EPA's size classes. It is owned by a local government (city, town, county or district) and draws groundwater, in Colfax County, New Mexico. EPA system ID: NM3526404; phone on file: 575-376-2232. They can tell you what your service line is made of and whether they pay to replace it.
Lead results over time
That is up 17 ppb from 0 ppb in the period ending 2025. The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Maxwell Water System is 17 ppb across 10 monitoring periods, 2 of them over the 15 ppb action level.
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2025 | 17 ppb over 15 |
| 2025 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2024 | 0 (not detected) |
| 2024 | 2.6 ppb |
| 2023 | 17 ppb over 15 |
| 2022 | 0.8 ppb |
| 2020 | 0.8 ppb |
| 2019 | 1.3 ppb |
| 2017 | 1.3 ppb |
| 2016 | 2 ppb |
How Maxwell Water System compares
Of the 504 New Mexico systems with a lead result, the median latest reading is 1.4 ppb; 14 are over 15 ppb right now and 46 have gone over at some point. Maxwell Water System's 17 ppb sits at the 98th percentile in New Mexico and the 99th nationally (higher means more lead).
Other water systems in Colfax County
12 other systems share Colfax County; 0 of them have a higher latest lead result than Maxwell Water System. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| City Of Raton/Raton Water Works | 9,733 | 3.4 ppb |
| Village Of Angel Fire | 6,045 | 15 ppb |
| Philmont Boy Scout Ranch - Headquarters | 2,000 | 3.9 ppb |
| Cimarron Water System | 1,260 | 0 (not detected) |
| Springer Water System | 1,170 | 0 (not detected) |
| Village Of Eagle Nest | 613 | 1.7 ppb |
| Maxwell Cooperative Water Users Assoc | 261 | 1 ppb |
| French Mdwca/Swa | 209 | 0 (not detected) |
| Miami Water Users Association | 135 | 5 ppb |
| Vermejo Park - Headquarters | 120 | 0 (not detected) |
Your move
Use a filter certified to NSF/ANSI 53 for lead on the tap you drink and cook from, now, before you test. Then test your own tap. If your own line is lead, replacing the private side runs about $1,200-$12,300 (EPA average about $4,700). Ask Maxwell Water System 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. The action level is dropping - the 10 ppb rule from 2027.