Every Spring the City of Portland, Oregon water bill includes a warning notice about Lead in the water (a notice that no one ever seems to read.)

Published May 5, 2017
Updated: February 28, 2022
[Scroll to bottom for the Rubin Family current [February 2022] water bill.]

Below are FOUR of my actual water bills from the City of Portland (colors and circles and arrows added by me for emphasis!). The first one is from when I originally published this post in May of 2017 [using my May of 2015 water bill], the second is 2019, the third is 2020 – and the last image is my current water bill [from February of 2022]. Each Spring the Portland Water Bureau includes a Lead warning with the water bill [not every month — just (randomly) once a year!

Each water bill with the warning includes this language (or similar):

“The Portland Water Bureau found high levels of lead in drinking water in some homes. Lead can cause serious health problems. For more information…”

Note; they say nothing about the Lead in the water in our public schools here in Portland!!!!! I don’t know how the city manages to be so disconnected from our city’s schools [still — in 2022]!

Scroll down to see each my personal water bills from 2015, 2019, 2020 and 2022 (I have other years on file too, and may update this post some time with all of the years I can find [I think the oldest one I have a copy of is from 2013… notably waaaaayyy “pre-Flint“!]) Click on any of the images below to see it full size.

Tamara, why are you sharing this with us?

I’m just flabbergasted that this is sent to ALL PORTLAND CITIZENS – ANNUALLY — and no one seems to care or want to do anything about it – so I decided to re-share this all with you this year (just to raise awareness that this is still happening and nothing is being done… again…still.)

Does YOUR water bill have a warning like this?
Where do you live?
[Feel free to leave a comment on this post with the answer!]

Yes, these are my actual bills

These are my actual water bills with my actual address (it’s a matter of public record for my business now anyway) and my actual account number (including the most recent one from 2022!) 🙂

“Wait! What? You have a $2,100.00 water bill?”

Pandemic impacts on my business (combined with the ongoing significant costs of my Civil Rights legal battle, suing the State of Oregon in Federal Court for multiple counts of civil rights violations against me – you can read the full latest filing here) have made it so we have not been able to pay our water bill this past year.

If someone “out there” – who in a position to do so – ever wanted to pay our water bill – I definitely wouldn’t put up a fight! However there is some pandemic-related financial relief from the city available to help families in similar situations (since, apparently I am not the only one in Portland with an outrageous water bill like this!), so I am not too panic’d about the amount due right now (over $2,100!!!)…because once I manage to finish my 2021 taxes I can apply for a grant to help cover a portion of what is past due…just add one more thing to my “must do asap” list. Lol!

On another note…

For those who want to support the work of Lead Safe Mama, LLC (in all of the normal ways — so we can at least keep the expenses of this little business covered), please check out this link >>>>. [There are lots of ways to support the childhood Lead-poisoning prevention advocacy work and independent consumer goods testing of Lead Safe Mama, LLC without spending a penny! Here’s the link with all the ways you can be involved in this work and have it make a difference! ]

Thanks for being here!

Tamara Rubin
#LeadSafeMama
Owner – Lead Safe Mama, LLC