Melvindale, MI
Exceeded the action level in the past
Latest 90th-percentile lead: 1.4 ppb (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.
Melvindale at a glance
Melvindale serves about 12,851 people through 3,880 service connections, which makes it a large system under EPA's size classes. It is owned by a local government (city, town, county or district) and draws surface water, in Wayne County, Michigan. EPA system ID: MI0004220; phone on file: 313-429-1080. They can tell you what your service line is made of and whether they pay to replace it.
Lead results over time
That is down 2.1 ppb from 3.5 ppb in the period ending 2024. The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Melvindale is 370 ppb across 9 monitoring periods, 1 of them over the 15 ppb action level.
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2025 | 1.4 ppb |
| 2024 | 3.5 ppb |
| 2023 | 2.1 ppb |
| 2022 | 2.6 ppb |
| 2021 | 5.27 ppb |
| 2020 | 4.58 ppb |
| 2020 | 3.11 ppb |
| 2019 | 370 ppb over 15 |
| 2017 | 2.8 ppb |
Against other Michigan systems
Of the 1,227 Michigan systems with a lead result, the median latest reading is 1 ppb; 31 are over 15 ppb right now and 109 have gone over at some point. Melvindale's 1.4 ppb sits at the 55th percentile in Michigan and the 62nd nationally (higher means more lead).
Nearby utilities
43 other systems share Wayne County; 25 of them have a higher latest lead result than Melvindale. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| Detroit City Of | 633,218 | 7.5 ppb |
| Dearborn | 109,976 | 6 ppb |
| Canton Township | 99,627 | 0 (not detected) |
| Livonia | 96,942 | 0 (not detected) |
| Westland | 85,420 | 0 (not detected) |
| Taylor | 63,409 | 10.7 ppb |
| Dearborn Heights | 57,774 | 0 (not detected) |
| Redford Township | 49,504 | 8.2 ppb |
| Lincoln Park | 38,144 | 3.1 ppb |
| Brownstown Township | 33,194 | 0 (not detected) |
What to do in your house
Test your own tap with a certified lab first-draw sample; Melvindale, MI 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 Melvindale 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.