How Eastern Oregonians Are Demanding Safe Drinking Water

Why does rural Oregon have a drinking water crisis?

We all deserve to trust that our water is safe to drink, but Lower Umatilla Basin locals have been forced to live without safe drinking water for decades. 

Industrial-scale agriculture, power plants, and data centers are the primary sources of nitrate contaminating our water. More recently, PFAS, known as 'forever chemicals,' have also been found (8).

In 1990, the State of Oregon declared the Lower Umatilla Basin groundwater, the primary source of our drinking water, contaminated by nitrate. 

So, who is responsible for eastern Oregon water contamination?

A Water Emergency in Morrow and Umatilla Counties

Guadalupe Martinez, a grandmother in Boardman, Oregon, has been buying bottled water for over 20 years.

“Ever since we’ve been living here, we’ve been buying [bottled] water,” she said. She can’t drink the water that comes out of her tap because the nitrate contamination would make her and her family sick (1).

Unfortunately, many residents, including Spanish-speaking residents, had no idea about nitrate contamination, its health symptoms, effects and the impact of exposure on infants and pregnant women.

Get facts and resources on clean drinking water in rural Oregon.

From the First Test to an Emergency Declaration

Starting in 2022, we went door-to-door to test wells and talk to people, and found that a majority of wells were contaminated.

We gathered our neighbors to take action into our own hands and ultimately tested 648 wells over five months.

In Morrow County, we found that more than 40% of the tested wells had nitrate levels that were unsafe to drink, and some were even six times the federal safety limit (4).

Our evidence backed up our demands and led Morrow County to declare a public health emergency over nitrate pollution (3). We immediately helped distribute bottled water and pressured the state to warn everyone in the region and develop a free well testing program.

Thanks to the community’s efforts, free well testing, filters, and bottled water are now available. Today, more than half of the households tested have undrinkable water, and there are hundreds of wells that are still left untested.

Progress toward safe water is possible.

“When we bought [our] place they didn’t say a darn thing about nitrate,” Michael Pearson told Governor Tina Kotek at the community meeting at the Boardman Senior Center. He had been drinking his well water for 30 years, unaware of the health effects (5).

This was the first time ever that a governor came to eastern Oregon to talk to us about the water crisis.

At the same meeting, neighbors shared that polluters are still asking taxpayers to solve a problem that we didn't create. One individual found out their water is nearly five times more contaminated than when they moved in and were told a clean well would cost them $24,000.

Following that visit, Governor Kotek promised our communities that she would bring “a new day” to the nitrate problem.

This moment was major progress, but it’s not enough. Sadly, the contamination has only gotten worse over the last decade (11).

We’re continuing to work together to hold polluters accountable and require actions that reduce nitrates and make sure our water is safe to drink (10).

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References and deeper reading:

1. Powerful port pollutes water for years with little state action (Oregon Capitol Chronicle, May 2022)

2. Water contamination worsened as DEQ went easy on Port of Morrow (Capitol Chronicle, May 2022)

3. Morrow County declares emergency over groundwater nitrate pollution (Oregon Capitol Chronicle, June 2022)

4. Oregonians with polluted wells demand state of emergency (OPB, April 2023)

5. Kotek visits Boardman residents with contaminated water for first time, hears frustrations, fears (Oregon Capitol Chronicle, May 2023)

6. All water well owners in the Lower Umatilla Basin offered nitrate testing, Oregon officials say (OPB, October 2023)

7. Boardman community organizer’s truck catches ‘suspicious’ blaze, local fire rescue says (OPB, November 2023)

8. About 19% of Oregonians at risk for PFAS groundwater contamination (OPB, November 2024)

9. State offers more free water testing as locals say state still not doing enough (OPB, July 2024)

10. State agencies pledge action on Eastern Oregon nitrates crisis — eventually (OPB, September 2024)

11. Nitrate contamination has gotten worse in eastern Oregon over the past decade (The Oregonian, January 2025)