EPA Orders School to Test Its Tap Water : Health: Wilsona Elementary must check for lead and copper contamination. It is one of seven campuses in state failing to do so.

An elementary school that failed to test its drinking water for lead and copper contamination as required by the Safe Drinking Water Act was ordered to do so Monday by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Wilsona Elementary, a kindergarten-through-fifth-grade campus, was one of seven California schools singled out by the EPA for failing to do the tests.

The tests are needed to find out whether the tap water at the Lake Los Angeles school poses any health hazards to students, federal officials said.

“We don’t know if these school water systems have high levels of lead and copper or not, so it is extremely important that they begin monitoring their water,” said Alexis Strauss, EPA’s regional water management division director, in a prepared statement.

The other schools that did not submit test results were in Burlingame, Los Gatos, Morgan Hill and Salinas. The testing was required at the more than 400 schools that run their own water systems, drawing from wells or other sources.

Chet Caldeira, superintendent of the Wilsona School District, said his district hired a laboratory to test the school’s water last year--but apparently not for lead and copper contamination.

“There was a slip-up somewhere in the request procedures or in the response procedures,” he said Monday. “But we will be able to correct it promptly.”

Although he vowed to comply with the EPA order, Caldeira added: “We don’t have any indication there’s any problem with the water.”

Wilsona Elementary School, which is more than 50 years old, draws drinking water from a nearby well.

The school has 754 students. The district’s other two campuses, which are newer, are connected to the county water system and were not required to undergo testing, Caldeira said.

EPA officials said most lead and copper contamination is produced by corrosion in pipes, solder and fixtures. The agency said lead levels in California drinking water are generally low, and that children are more likely to be exposed to the metal through old paint, soil and dust.

The testing is important at schools because lead causes more serious health problems in children than in adults, including impairment of their physical and mental development, EPA officials said. High doses of copper have been linked to digestive problems.