Bloomington, IL Water Use Rules: Leak Reporting Duty (2026)

Bloomington's water utility carries leak-repair duties on both sides of the meter. Under the Water Emergency Response Ordinance, City Code § 27-510, once a moderate drought is proclaimed the City must institute an increased maintenance effort to identify and correct water leaks by initiating a complete leak detection survey, and any leak under the Water Department's control that exceeds 100 gallons per minute must be corrected within 72 hours of the Department becoming aware of it. On the customer side, the same section treats an unrepaired leak as an enforcement trigger during a drought: a customer given a ten-day notice to repair one or more leaks who fails to comply can be denied continued nonessential service, including water hauling, while the drought proclamation is in effect.

Outside a declared drought, leak repairs are handled through billing. City Code § 27-511, effective May 1, 2019, routes every request for a City services utility bill adjustment tied to a leak through the City of Bloomington Water Leak Adjustment Policy, a standing policy the City Council can amend from time to time; the Director of Finance and Water Department Director may also compromise or waive charges under § 27-509 where the City's own fault contributed to the situation. Because an inaccessible or unread meter can mask a leak for months, § 27-302 lets the Water Department treat a meter as inaccessible and replace it after four consecutive months without an actual reading, another mechanism aimed at catching undetected leaks before they run up an unpaid balance.