Fluoridation to continue

Port Orchard will continue to fluoridate the city’s water supply.

The city decided at a June 17 city council work study session to continue fluoridating city water after a series of informal ballots sent along with city utility bills in February showed that a majority of the 753 people who completed the survey wanted the fluoride to remain in the system.

In the questionnaire, 446 respondents were pro fluoride, 304 were against and three had no comment. Twenty percent of the 3,804 surveys mailed out were returned.

The issue of water fluoridation first came up in 2011, after a Port Orchard couple spoke during the public comment section at a city council meeting regarding the alleged negatives offluoride.

City Council members agreed that a majority had spoken, and that fluoride would remain in the system.

“We did the survey, we looked at it and now we know,” City Council Member Jerry Childs said.

The question of fluoridation could come up again in the future, though, when the city builds an additional water supply well, known as Well 10. Well 10 will supply water to the McCormick Woods neighborhood of Port Orchard. Currently, water to McCormick Woods is supplied by a Bremerton water supply, which does not fluoridate it’s water.

Rob Putaansuu, city council member and the city’s utility committee chairman, said that question of adding fluoride to the additional well was at least a couple of years out.

“We will have to make a decision in the future when we bring in Well 10,” he said.

 

Contact Port Orchard Independent Staff Writer Brett Cihon at bcihon@portorchardindependent.com or 360-876-4414.

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