HAMBURG, NY — A water quality director with the Erie County (Buffalo) Water Authority is under investigation for allegedly changing the results of a report on a water sample taken from an elementary school, according to a recent article in The Buffalo News.
One of the lab workers who confirmed the presence of E. Coli in a water sample from the Dodge Elementary School in Amherst, NY, said that her supervisor, Water Quality Director Paul Whittam, omitted mention of the pathogen's presence in the water sample on reports filed with the Erie County Health Department in January, according to the article.
Microbiologist Joanne McGrath, who along with a fellow lab worker detected the E. Coli, said her supervisor explained that he changed the report because lab analysts must have misinterpreted the results, according to the article.
McGrath was quoted in the article as saying that follow-up procedures were appropriate in that a total of five more samples were taken from the school and taps surrounding the school; none showed any traces of E. Coli or other coliform bacteria, according to the article.
The US Environmental Protection Agency and the US attorney's office are investigating the allegations, the article says.
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