MINNEAPOLIS — Alta Manuel has lived in her home built in 1958 for 30 years.
She has seen her kids grow up there, and now, she's helping out with five grandkids and four great-grandkids.
She wants to know for sure if her house is safe from lead.
"I've got these new grandbabies coming along — great-grandbabies," she said. "I'm watching them five days a week."
A team from Hennepin County visited her home Tuesday afternoon to spend a few hours checking for lead.
"The purpose of our program was to help families protect their kids from lead," said Mike Jensen, the lead hazard control program manager for Hennepin County. "We do that through the inspection and finding the lead hazards and then using grant funds to address any hazards that we find.”
According to the last publicly available data from 2020, there were 487 children in Minnesota under 6 years old with an elevated blood lead level (EBLL).
About 1-2 percent of children in Minneapolis or St. Paul had an EBLL in recent years, according to the Minnesota Department of Health.
DOH officials said that is double the statewide average and higher than any other region of Minnesota. According to Hennepin County, testing has increased in recent years.
And while they know of more children in Minnesota who have been exposed, they said that the rate of exposure has gone down.
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development awarded Hennepin County $6.7 million to go toward lead exposure prevention.
The largest award the county has received for lead will go toward providing safer homes for low-income families in 300 housing units with lead hazards.
According to the CDC, children from low-income households and living in homes built before 1978 are at the most significant risk of lead exposure.
"We do use geographic targeting that includes analysis of poverty levels, historical EBLL prevalence, and then the age of housing to try to focus our resources where it's needed most," said Jensen.
The team only found lead paint on the trim of Manuel's garage.
It's a relief to her that there's only one spot.
"I know the dangers that it can cause and teach children, especially young children," said Manuel. "If they start picking at it and eat the dangers that it can bring on them."
To see if you qualify for a free home test and up to $25,000 in repairs to make your house lead-free, click here.
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