State Official – Landfill “Likely Source” Of Well Contamination

 Rupa Shenoy-WGBH

Mark and Melissa Widing attend Charlton

Board of Health meetings regularly to ask

for help with their contaminated well water.

Credit: Rupa Shenoy

For months, lead leached into the Flint, Michigan, water supply – and no one did anything about it. In the wake of that crisis, the nation is re-examining its water supply. But some families in central Massachusetts are wondering why the increased scrutiny hasn’t helped them.

Those families have been living on bottled water for months because their water supply is contaminated. State environmental officials say the only possible source they’ve identified is the biggest active municipal landfill in the state, just west of Worcester. But the operator of that landfill, Casella Waste Systems, Inc, says its safe.