Is OAKLAND WATER DEPT's water safe to drink?
OAKLAND WATER DEPT has a health-based violation on record, but none in the last five years - an older issue, not necessarily a current one. It serves 12,754 people through 4,800 service connections.
Ranked against every other system in this dataset
106 total violations and 2 health-based ones put OAKLAND WATER DEPT at the 55th percentile nationally for violation burden, rank 5,763 of 12,903.
How OAKLAND WATER DEPT compares within NJ
NJ's 270 covered systems average 5.3 health-based violations each; OAKLAND WATER DEPT carries 2, not more than typical for the state. See the lead and copper guide for why lead counts differently.
Most recent violation on record
The last violation EPA has on record for OAKLAND WATER DEPT is from 2027-06-12 (health-based: 2004-01-06). Last reported to EPA: 06/30/2026.
What kind of problem, specifically
OAKLAND WATER DEPT's flagged contaminants and rule violations, grouped by what they actually mean for a filter choice rather than left as EPA's raw code list:
- Microbial contamination / treatment technique - flagged from: Coliform (TCR)
- Synthetic organic chemicals / pesticides / VOCs - flagged from: Tetrachloroethylene
The most severe category on record is microbial contamination / treatment technique, which points toward a microbial-class filter if you want to address it directly.
What this data is and is not
This is what OAKLAND WATER DEPT reported to its state primacy agency and EPA under the Safe Drinking Water Act - real regulatory record, not a lab test of your specific tap. Between the utility's meter and OAKLAND WATER DEPT's customers' taps is household plumbing, invisible to a system-level record ranked 5,763th of 12,903 by violation count. The guide to what this data misses covers that gap.