Widefield School District addresses water safety concerns as school year approaches

Widefield School District 3 has announced how it plans to handle ongoing concerns about the safety of the drinking water in Security, Widefield and Fountain.

The district says it has been in communication with all three water districts, El Paso County Public Health and the Colorado Department of Health and Environment.

Based on guidance from those organizations, the district says it will not be providing bottled or separately sourced drinking water at schools, nor will they use separately sourced water for cooking.

The Security Water and Sanitation Districts is broken up into three zones. The older areas immediately east of Highway 85/87 are most likely to still be receiving some of the contaminated water.

The newer neighborhoods further to the east and north are zones 2 and 3. The utility says those areas are primarily getting surface water from Pueblo Reservoir.

In June, the district 3 board of education approved easements across school properties for the Security Water and Sanitation Districts to install pipeline interconnections that will bring clean water from zone 2 into zone 1.

The school district says it has been told that all three water districts will switch exclusively to the clean surface water once the peak demand season has ended, possibly September.

Fountain Utilities says it is currently sourcing 100% of its water from Pueblo Reservoir.

The district also provided the following breakdown of locations of the schools by district and zone:

Security Water District:
Zone 1: Pinello, North, Venetucci
Zone 2: Widefield Elementary, Widefield H.S., Discovery H.S., Sproul, Widefield Parks and Recreation
Zone 3: French

Widefield Water District:
Zone 1: Watson, Webster, Sunrise, Talbott, Mesa Ridge, James Madison Charter Academy
Zone 2-3: no schools
Zone 4: King

Fountain Utilities:
Janitell

The first day of school in District 3 is August 16.