Walking M Ranches, CA
Lead detected, under the action levels
Latest 90th-percentile lead: 3.35 ppb (monitoring period 2017-2019). 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.
Walking M Ranches at a glance
Walking M Ranches serves about 54 people through 19 service connections, which makes it a very small system under EPA's size classes. It is privately owned and draws groundwater, in Santa Barbara County, California. EPA system ID: CA4200804; phone on file: 805-252-9212. Ask them for your address in their service line inventory - every system had to publish one by Oct 2024.
Lead results over time
The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Walking M Ranches is 3.35 ppb across 1 monitoring period, none of them over 15 ppb.
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2019 | 3.35 ppb |
How Walking M Ranches compares
Of the 2,884 California systems with a lead result, the median latest reading is 0 ppb; 30 are over 15 ppb right now and 215 have gone over at some point. Walking M Ranches's 3.35 ppb sits at the 87th percentile in California and the 84th nationally (higher means more lead).
Nearby utilities
62 other systems share Santa Barbara County; 7 of them have a higher latest lead result than Walking M Ranches. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| City Of Santa Maria Utilities Department | 112,208 | 0 (not detected) |
| City Of Santa Barbara Water Department | 93,334 | 2.5 ppb |
| Goleta Water District | 85,535 | 0 (not detected) |
| Lompoc-City Water Utility Div | 40,538 | 0 (not detected) |
| Golden State Water Company - Orcutt | 34,267 | 2.6 ppb |
| Carpinteria Valley Water District | 16,356 | 0 (not detected) |
| American Water O&M, Llc - Vsfb | 14,971 | 0 (not detected) |
| Montecito Water Dist | 12,010 | 0 (not detected) |
| Guadalupe Water Department | 8,897 | 0 (not detected) |
| Vandenberg Village Comm. Serv. Dist. | 7,308 | 0 (not detected) |
What to do in your house
Test your own tap with a certified lab first-draw sample; Solvang, CA 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 Walking M Ranches 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. Why sampled homes are the worst-case ones is in the guide to reading the number. Size matters more than most people expect: small vs large water systems.