Many Seacoast residents attended a recent public meeting in Greenland to get answers about the safety of their water. They didn’t get answers then, or since then.

We all agree with Gov. Sununu’s Feb. 9 budget address that: “Drinking water is a priority. There is no bigger public trust than every time we as citizens turn on that faucet, we trust that our government has done their job in ensuring clean water for us and our children.”

Alarming news on the Seacoast has sparked public distrust about the safety of our water: a pediatric cancer cluster of two rare cancers identified in 2016; high levels of toxic chemicals called PFCs migrating from the Coakley Landfill Superfund Site downstream in Berry’s Brook; private wells around Coakley that test positive for regulated PFCs and other unregulated toxic chemicals. Vulnerable children live here.

The public wants to know. How safe is our water?

The EPA and New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services say the current 70 parts per trillion standard for PFCs in our drinking water is safe. Really? When just eight months ago, and in the seven years between 2009 and May 2016, the EPA and DES told us that 600 parts per trillion was safe?

The public wants to know? Where are these chemicals coming from?

The EPA and DES say they cannot link these chemicals in private wells to Coakley. Really? If they are so sure the high surface water levels of PFCs in Berry’s Brook are from Coakley, why not in private wells in all directions of the dump?

The public wants to know. What are the health effects of these chemicals, these PFCs?

Dupont Chemical must see the link between PFC chemicals and poor health. Why else would they pay almost $700 million in settlements for health effects from PFCs to people who suffered them? No one can say that their sample of 69,000 people in this case was too small or that the results are not clear. Dupont paid up.

The public wants to know. What can we do about this?

Emerging science has called into question the safety of our water. Federal and state agencies and New Hampshire citizens have been catching up to this science, since private well testing began in April around Coakley. While we haven’t gotten answers, we can control New Hampshire’s standard for safer water. We can take action by writing our legislators today in support of House Bill 485. This will mandate N.H. DES to adopt more protective drinking water standards for “human life at all stages.”

Let your voice be heard. Go to generalcourt.gov.nh.us. Send an email or call members of the Resource, Recreation and Development Committee, the N.H. House speaker, majority leader, your own state representatives, state senator – anyone who will listen.

Let New Hampshire define the safety of our water. Let’s ensure that we have safe water for us and our children.

(Deborah White lives in Rye.)