The Times of Northwest Indiana reports that school districts interested in participating in the voluntary program will need to complete a questionnaire that the authority will use to prioritize the extent of sampling needed in each district.

Jim McGoff, the authority’s director of environmental programs, says the program has been planned for several months.

East Chicago Mayor Anthony Copeland said in December that drinking water tests performed by the Environmental Protection Agency found elevated lead levels within an area of East Chicago considered a USS Lead Superfund site, where hundreds of families were displaced this summer.

Lead in the water isn’t related to the lead- and arsenic-contaminated soil at the Superfund site.

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