When Will Stoerner moved to Austin’s Colony neighborhood in far East Austin, he knew about the water issues. For decades, residents have been complaining of hard and discolored water in the area served by Texas Water Utilities, a private service provider, outside the jurisdiction of Austin Water. So in 2020, Stoerner purchased a home filtration system for around $1,800 to be safe: “It was a cost I was willing to eat at the time,” he said.
Austin’s Colony residents have had little recourse other than buying filtration devices or bottled water; since their water is owned by a private company, there’s no elected official to complain to, just the notoriously lax regulatory body TCEQ. But on June 18, at a community meeting, UT researchers presented residents with the first ever peer-reviewed scientific study of their water, published in the science journal PLOS in May.
UT researchers collected 90 samples from both the faucets of eight individual homes and at the source, wells in and outside the neighborhood, between April 2024 and October 2025. They also partnered with PODER (People in Defense of Earth and Her Resources) to survey the community about their experiences. Of the 271 respondents to the survey, 70% reported discolored water, and only 7% drink tap water without using additional treatment, like water softeners or reverse osmosis systems.
Of the 81 samples from the neighborhood, three were found to contain contaminants including lead or arsenic exceeding World Health Organization, Environmental Protection Agency, or Texas Commission on Environmental Quality regulatory limits. Two samples had manganese and iron concentrations exceeding EPA and TCEQ limits. “There is no amount of lead that is not harmful for the human body,” said David Bahamón-Pinzón, the lead researcher on the study.
Even without lead, hard water not regulated by health standards can still have adverse effects – skin and hair issues, buildup in pipes or household appliances. This is reflected in the study: 81% of the samples were classified as hard, 92% of survey respondents reported buildup on faucets, and 68% reported skin problems.
In light of this study, Stoerner has purchased another reverse osmosis unit, meant for well water that contains heavy metals specifically. “When I came out here, I could have bought the one that would filter out the arsenic and the lead. There is no way I would have thought that I would have needed that,” he said. “However, my wife is pregnant, and there is a 0% chance that I want any lead in our drinking water.”
Crucially, water samples taken at the source met TCEQ’s regulatory standards. Once they had mixed with other water sources and corrosion in the pipe system, contaminated water came out at residents’ faucets. TCEQ doesn’t test at the faucet to determine whether water meets its regulatory standards.
Furthermore, households in the northeast of the neighborhood receive softer water from the Carrizo-Wilcox Aquifer, while those in the southwest that draw from wells in the neighborhood and in Manor receive harder water. If Texas Water Utilities used more from the Carrizo-Wilcox, mixed with fewer sources, it would “likely decrease hardness and discoloration issues,” posits the study. But as more people move to the area and water scarcity issues persist, there will be more competition for that aquifer.
Some residents at the June meeting were disgruntled that only eight households were tested – around 8,000 people live in Austin’s Colony. Jay Banner, a professor in UT’s Department of Geological Sciences and co-author of the study, explained at the meeting that a $7 million grant from the National Science Foundation for this work “got DOGE’d a year ago, got pulled back. Could we do more? Can we do all the houses? Yeah, we need to pay for people’s time to do it.”
Still, this study is a huge step in being able to advocate for change. “It’s our tax dollars that are funding TCEQ,” Banner said. “One could go to the state Legislature and say TCEQ’s current testing is completely, woefully inadequate. We’re missing everything that happens from the entry point to your house, and the laws should be changed to make the testing much more rigorous.”
PODER is hosting legislative workshops to teach the community how to advocate in preparation for the 2027 session. “Our goal is to try to change policies and bills to work in our favor,” said PODER’s Bianca Guerrero, who lives and organizes in the neighborhood. But the majority of residents are working people, and showing up at 9am on a Wednesday to navigate the winding halls of the Capitol is a tall order.
Until something changes, Austin’s Colony residents are paying several times more than Austin Water customers for worse service. Stoerner’s newest filtration unit cost him $225. Texas Water Utilities’ base charge is $59.39 per month – Austin Water’s is $7.75. The average Austin Water bill ranges from $40-80 a month, and Stoerner’s last bill was almost $300 – not to mention the hundreds he will spend each year on replacement filters.
TWU told KUT earlier this year that it had invested $6.3 million in 2025 to replace pipe infrastructure in the neighborhood, and the day after the UT meeting, Stoerner received an email detailing further improvements to the hardness of the water. Starting in June, there was an extra charge on Stoerner’s bill called “Docket 58682” for $26, referring to an ongoing rate case with the state’s Public Utility Commission over TWU’s application to recoup $81 million in improvement costs, which has drawn hundreds of ratepayer protests over the last year.
“Until legislation changes, [the neighborhood is] not going to see a lower water bill for a minute,” Stoerner said. “And I have zero choice in the matter. I can’t argue with them and say, ‘Hey, don’t you think that’s a little high? Can you tell me where my money’s going?’ You can’t f– us in the pocket and provide poor service. That’s un-American. It’s one or the other, right?”
This article appears in July 10 • 2026.