Baltimore County Police supply Dundalk officers with bottled water amid lead testing

Luke Parker

The Baltimore Sun

May 14, 2025

The Baltimore County Police Department supplied its officers at a Dundalk facility with 50 cases of water Wednesday as the building undergoes additional lead testing — less than a day after Baltimore County’s police chief described union complaints about the department’s handling of water quality concerns as “theater.”

Those provisions, Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 4 President Dave Rose said, would be replenished as needed, and similar concerns at precincts in Wilkens, Cockeysville and Essex “will be addressed.”

“I’m glad they finally got the clean water for our members in that building. It should have been easier to do so,” the union leader told The Baltimore Sun. “They just need to follow through with the other facilities as well.”

A police spokesperson said Wednesday that the department is taking water quality concerns seriously.

Chief Robert McCullough told the Baltimore County Council on Tuesday that he thought the union complaints were really “about employees wanting [the department] to provide them with bottled water stations in their workplace,” and less about “the actual water in the building and the testing of that water.”

“It’s basically theater,” he said.

However, department spokesperson Joy Stewart said the chief was not dismissing an officer’s concern as “theater,” but rather how the FOP characterized department “efforts to address our member’s concern.”

“Chief Robert McCullough has always advocated for the safety and welfare of the Department’s members,” Stewart said, adding the department “acted in good faith and worked diligently” once the issue was raised.

McCullough’s comments came hours after The Sun reported the union’s worries over ongoing lead testing at at the Dundalk facility and fruitless requests for water bottles.

Rose, the union president, described McCullough’s “dismissing” statements as irresponsible and “deeply troubling.”

“Let’s be clear: This is not ‘theater,’” Rose said. “The buildings in question are old, and tests have shown unacceptable levels of lead in the water. Our members have a right not to trust it.”

According to an April 23 report reviewed by The Sun, testing found lead in two areas of the North Point Government Center in Dundalk, where approximately 50 officers in the department’s K-9 and SWAT units are stationed.

One of the sites, a sink in a women’s restroom, did not register enough lead to fail the test, according to results The Sun reviewed. But the second, a men’s locker room, did.

Police said North Point’s “unoccupied” first floor, where the problem water was detected, is not supposed to be used, though Rose said it had been cleaned enough “for some training.”

Additionally, no lead was detected in a drinking fountain tested that same day, police said. The analysis reviewed by The Sun confirmed the results.

Stewart said on Monday the sink faucet that failed the lead test was recently replaced and a sign had been placed nearby “to ensure that water from the faucet is not unintentionally consumed.”

Stewart said the county had also commissioned testing for 14 more sites at North Point, including its main water line. The results are pending, she said.

A junior high school until 1981, the building is used by both police and the county’s Department of Recreation and Parks, which hosts flag football, soccer, wrestling and theater programs there. But park staff and participants cannot access the police side of the building, said Erica Palmisano, a spokesperson for the county executive.

Though testing and results to this point have been limited to the Dundalk building, Rose said the officer’s union heard similar complaints from staff at the department’s Essex and Cockeysville precincts, which were established in 1969 and 1973 respectively.

According to the EPA, there is no safe level of lead in drinking water, which can be contaminated by corroding pipes. Because Congress didn’t require “lead free” plumbing for public water systems until 1986, the federal agency says homes and facilities built before the law are more likely to have lead piping.

Palmisano said Monday that the county’s Property Management Division had not been asked to test the water at either Essex or Cockeysville.

But Rose said progress has been made on the concerns at both locations, with new water dispensers ordered at Cockeysville and Wilkens, and another in process for Essex.