His house is at the center of Newark’s water crisis. He had no idea.

Newark water filters

Vincent Bryant, of Newark, shows the filter that hasn't been working in his home to reduce levels of lead in the drinking water. Newark distributed the filter residents to remove led from the drinking water. This filter is one of two hasn't done that.(Barry Carter NJ | Advance Media)

Vincent Bryant hadn’t made the connection until he saw news reports about Newark’s problem with lead in the drinking water.

The city started distributing 70,000 cases of bottled water last week after filters in two of three homes that it tested did not reduce levels of lead.

City residents have been dealing with elevated lead levels in the drinking water for the past three years. The PUR filters, which are nationally certified to remove lead from the drinking water, have been given to more than 39,000 Newark residents.

“Then all of a sudden I see this stuff come up on the news," Bryant said. “I didn’t pay it no attention or (realize) that it was based on my test."

But it was.

“That’s when all hell broke loose," Bryant, 72, said about Newark’s emergency bottled water distribution. “They’ve been testing the heck out of this place."

The city, he said, came to his home May 1, July 10, July 31, Aug. 2 and between 8 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. on Aug. 5. The frequency of the visits, especially when officials came in the evening, made Bryant concerned.

“What the heck is going on," he said.

Bryant figured all of the testing was tied to a program to replace the lead service lines in the house where he’s lived since 1976.

The city, he said, told him that tests from the week before were inconclusive. With the exception of the Aug. 5 visit, Bryant said he had to run cold water from his kitchen faucet for 10 minutes at 9 a.m.

Six hours later technicians hired by the city, state and federal government returned to test the filter he had that resembles a water pitcher. Bryant said they would pour water from his faucet into the pitcher, then test it to see if lead was in the water.

Bryant wasn’t worried, because he said he never used the city’s pitcher to remove lead from the water. He had his own pitcher from ZeroWater, which sells filtration products.

When the city distributed filters, Bryant was given the pitcher, because he said the PUR faucet filter would not attach to his faucet. He took the pitcher anyway but used the ZeroWater filter instead while continuing to purchase bottled water, as well.

The ZeroWater filter worked. The city’s filter didn’t, based on test results that he had to sign for after the Aug. 5 visit.

Frank Baraff, the city’s director of communication, said thousands of pitchers were given out to residents when the PUR filters did not fit their faucets.

“Nonetheless, the problem is still there," Baraff said.

Meanwhile, city, state and federal officials are all on the ground testing a sample of homes, trying to figure out why the filters in Bryant’s and another home didn’t work, and to see if the problem is more widespread.

“Until we pinpoint it, we’re going to be giving out the free water,” Baraff said.

Bryant said the levels of lead with the city’s filter were high, and levels for his filter showed there was no lead in the water.

His wife, D. Bryant, however, tested positive for high lead levels in April. She said she didn’t realize Newark had a problem and had not used the filter from the city or one from ZeroWater.

“I had been drinking water from the tap until April," she said. “I’m not nervous. I’ve just got to find out what to do about it."

The CDC has asserted there is no safe blood lead level. Though concerns about BLL is often cited among children and pregnant women, the CDC has also identified health effects in adults who have lead in their blood.

Bryant said he’ll get checked out, but he’s not worrying about it. For now, he just can’t wait for the water testing to be over.

“I didn’t know it was going to be all of this," Bryant said. “I guess the pipes done got old."

Read more of NJ.com’s coverage of New Jersey water issues here.

Barry Carter may be reached at bcarter@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @BarryCarterSL. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tips.

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