The City of Prescott has received the first payment in a series of settlement agreements related to PFAS chemical contamination in City wells. This payment represents a partial payment in one of the settlements, specifically with 3M, as settlement payments will be made in ten separate installments through 2033. It is expected that both this payment and the second payment will be made this year.
The first settlement check that the City received was for $548,873.89. Due to the formula being used by the claims administrator, the next payment is expected to be larger than the first. Additional settlements have been reached with DuPont, TYCO, and BASF, with payments expected from these parties in the near future.
Prescott had one well that was determined to be out of compliance with EPA standards for PFAS, which was set in 2024. That well was taken offline, bringing the Prescott water system into full compliance.
FAQs (These were posted on the City of Prescott’s Facebook page and are the responses from Steven Olfers, Utilities Manager for the City)
Q: What are we using the money for?
A: We will use this money to offset the continuing costs for mitigating PFAS in our water supply.
Q: Will the money be sent to the customers?
A: No, any settlement money will be used to design and build a PFAS treatment system at Airport Well #5 and any other affected wells.
We are already planning a design and construct for the PFAS treatment system in the 2027 Fiscal Year. We will soon be bringing to Council a proposal for a contract to assist Public Works in deciding how and where we will treat PFAS. Only one well, Airport Well #5, exceeds the PFAS Maximum Contaminate Limit (MCL), thus the others will be left as is unless the rules change.
It’s important to be aware that EPA just reduced the regulated PFAS to only two types, PFOA and PFOS at 4 parts per trillion (ppt) and also pushed the compliance date from 2029 to 2031. This means the City of Prescott is not required to meet the MCL until 2031, six years from now. Although we would not be out of compliance if we ran Airport Well #5 today, we removed it from the system out of an abundance of caution.
3 thoughts on “City of Prescott Receives First Installment of $3 Million Dollar PFAS Settlement”
Stop draining Lynx Lake and stop raising our water rates – always right before summer! Refund some of that money to the customers who are all doing their very best to conserve water but never see any return for their efforts.
If anyone has foresight, say ten years from now, the people who live in Prescott will be taking their showers once every two weeks, doing laundry every two months, there will be no greenery around their homes just weeds. We will turn our thermostats down to 25 degrees in the winter and not run our air conditions in the summer. And as for the big guys, i.e. APS and City of Prescott, they will be in money hog heaven and could care less. Squeeze the little guy dry to keep the City and the utility companies in money heaven. If all of these increases continue, this is where we are headed.
How is it that Maricopa County approved a very huge water user namely the Taiwan owned Computer Chip factory that never submitted a 100 year water guarantee yet Arizona is on its way to a very severe drinking water shortage ???
Same thing with all the new residential building in Yavapai County?..
I guess everyone’s forgotten the time that people’s well ran dry in Chino Valley?…
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