Park Forest, IL
Lead detected, under the action levels
Latest 90th-percentile lead: 2.3 ppb (monitoring period 2021-2023). 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.
Park Forest at a glance
Park Forest serves about 21,687 people through 9,060 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 groundwater, in Cook County, Illinois. EPA system ID: IL0314740; phone on file: 708-503-7702. They can tell you what your service line is made of and whether they pay to replace it.
Every lead result on file
Against the period ending 2020 (1.66 ppb) the latest result is about the same. The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Park Forest is 3.2 ppb across 3 monitoring periods, none of them over 15 ppb.
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2023 | 2.3 ppb |
| 2020 | 1.66 ppb |
| 2017 | 3.2 ppb |
How Park Forest compares
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. Park Forest's 2.3 ppb sits at the 75th percentile in Illinois and the 76th nationally (higher means more lead).
Nearby utilities
154 other systems share Cook County; 75 of them have a higher latest lead result than Park Forest. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| Chicago | 2,721,308 | 6.4 ppb |
| Cicero | 83,000 | 5 ppb |
| Schaumburg | 75,750 | 0.87 ppb |
| Evanston | 74,486 | 6.5 ppb |
| Arlington Heights | 73,320 | 7.6 ppb |
| Palatine | 70,875 | 8.9 ppb |
| Skokie | 66,422 | 9.77 ppb |
| Des Plaines | 60,675 | 5.7 ppb |
| Oak Lawn | 58,362 | 9.3 ppb |
| Orland Park | 58,020 | 0 (not detected) |
Your move
Test your own tap with a certified lab first-draw sample; Park Forest, 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 Park Forest 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. Size matters more than most people expect: small vs large water systems.