Pathways, PA
Above the federal action level
Latest 90th-percentile lead: 16 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. 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.
Pathways at a glance
Pathways serves about 53 people through 2 service connections, which makes it a very small system under EPA's size classes. It is privately owned and draws groundwater, in Delaware County, Pennsylvania. EPA system ID: PA1230886; phone on file: 610-459-9177. Ask them for your address in their service line inventory - every system had to publish one by Oct 2024.
Every lead result on file
The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Pathways is 16 ppb across 1 monitoring period, 1 of them over the 15 ppb action level.
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2025 | 16 ppb over 15 |
Where this result ranks
Of the 516 Pennsylvania systems with a lead result, the median latest reading is 2 ppb; 143 are over 15 ppb right now and 156 have gone over at some point. Pathways's 16 ppb sits at the 74th percentile in Pennsylvania and the 99th nationally (higher means more lead).
Nearby utilities
4 other systems share Delaware County; 1 of them has a higher latest lead result than Pathways. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| Chester Water Authority | 140,437 | 4.76 ppb |
| Veolia Water Bethel | 7,809 | 3 ppb |
| Brinton Manor | 196 | - |
| Southpoint Homeowners Assoc | 40 | 24.5 ppb |
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 Pathways 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.