Meta Pws, MO
Lead detected, under the action levels
Latest 90th-percentile lead: 1.3 ppb (monitoring period 2022-2024). 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.
Meta Pws at a glance
Meta Pws serves about 210 people through 104 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 Osage County, Missouri. EPA system ID: MO3010517; phone on file: 573-229-4439. Ask them for your address in their service line inventory - every system had to publish one by Oct 2024.
Meta Pws's lead record
Against the period ending 2022 (1.6 ppb) the latest result is about the same. The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Meta Pws is 4.17 ppb across 8 monitoring periods, none of them over 15 ppb.
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2024 | 1.3 ppb |
| 2022 | 1.6 ppb |
| 2021 | 1.6 ppb |
| 2021 | 1.6 ppb |
| 2019 | 2.6 ppb |
| 2018 | 2.6 ppb |
| 2018 | 2.6 ppb |
| 2016 | 4.17 ppb |
How Meta Pws compares
Of the 1,674 Missouri systems with a lead result, the median latest reading is 1.04 ppb; 2 are over 15 ppb right now and 74 have gone over at some point. Meta Pws's 1.3 ppb sits at the 56th percentile in Missouri and the 60th nationally (higher means more lead).
Other water systems in Osage County
9 other systems share Osage County; 4 of them have a higher latest lead result than Meta Pws. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| Osage County Pwsd 3 | 2,800 | 0 (not detected) |
| Linn Pws | 1,500 | 1.58 ppb |
| Osage Co Pwsd 1 | 1,221 | 3.16 ppb |
| Osage County Pwsd 2 North | 705 | 6.44 ppb |
| Osage County Pwsd 2 South | 468 | 1.3 ppb |
| Freeburg Pws | 450 | 0 (not detected) |
| Chamois Pws | 396 | 6.5 ppb |
| Frankenstein Pws | 130 | 1.04 ppb |
| Linn Acres Mobile Home Park | 25 | 0 (not detected) |
Next steps for Meta, MO
Test your own tap with a certified lab first-draw sample; Meta, MO 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 Meta Pws 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. The lead result guide covers how utilities pick the homes they sample. Systems that went over once often dip back under; here is what that means.