Read the full article by Emmett Gartner (The Maine Monitor)
“Days before winter break ended in December 2022, Bill Hansen was relieved to learn that Jordan-Small Middle School in Raymond had no traces of ‘forever chemicals’ in tests of the school’s water system.
Hansen, the Windham Raymond School District’s facilities director, was on vacation in Rockland at the time, visiting venues for his daughter’s wedding, as test results for the harmful chemicals called PFAS began rolling in for schools statewide.
He initially thought if Jordan-Small was in the clear, then so was Raymond Elementary, just down the road. It was a promising start for the district east of Sebago Lake and its six schools.
‘We’re doing good,’ Hansen said at the time. ‘This is awesome.’
But a couple of days later, on Dec. 30, Hansen received a bombshell. Raymond Elementary’s well water tested nearly 50 times higher than the state limit for PFAS levels. Just three days before students returned, the school learned it had the most contaminated public water system in the state. “…