St. Cloud water quality · Public data
Your water report is public.
Here it is in plain numbers.
St. Cloud homes on city water are served by Toho Water Authority, drawing from the Floridan Aquifer. Toho publishes a full water quality report every year, and independent groups summarize the same data. Nobody needs to sit at your kitchen table to “test” what is already published. This page translates the report.
01 · What the report measured
The 2025 numbers for the
City of St. Cloud system.
From Toho’s 2025 Annual Water Quality Report (City of St. Cloud Water System, PWS ID 349-1373). Every result below was within its legal limit, and the system reported no violations.
| Measure | 2025 result | Legal limit | What it means at home |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chlorine (disinfectant residual) | 1.57 ppm avg range 0.5–2.9 |
4.0 ppm | Chlorine keeps the water disinfected on its way to your tap. That residual is also the taste and smell most people notice, and the most common reason homeowners ask about carbon filtration. |
| Total trihalomethanes (TTHMs) | 55.6 ppb avg range 15.7–69.6 |
80 ppb | Byproducts that form when disinfectant meets natural organic matter in aquifer water. St. Cloud treats with MIEX ion exchange before disinfection specifically to hold these down. |
| Haloacetic acids (HAA5) | 39.5 ppb avg range 6.3–46.5 |
60 ppb | A second family of disinfection byproducts, tracked for the same reason as TTHMs. |
| Lead (at the tap) | 1.8 ppb 90th percentile |
15 ppb action level | Lead comes from home plumbing, not the aquifer. Toho’s 2024 inventory found no lead service lines in its service area, and no sampled home exceeded the action level. |
| Copper (at the tap) | 0.216 ppm 90th percentile |
1.3 ppm action level | Also a plumbing-corrosion measure, comfortably below the level that triggers required action. |
| Fluoride | 0.75 ppm last measured 2023 |
4.0 ppm | One change to know: as of July 1, 2025, Toho discontinued adding fluoride to the water supply. |
| Nitrate | 0.2 ppm | 10 ppm | A fertilizer and septic-system indicator. St. Cloud’s result is a small fraction of the limit. |
Averages are the report’s running annual averages (LRAA/RAA) for the stated monitoring periods; some substances are sampled less often than yearly, as the report notes. Full tables, sources and methods are in Toho’s report linked above.
02 · What the report doesn’t settle
Legal is one question.
Comfortable is another.
The report answers the safety question, and on that question St. Cloud’s water passes. Toho’s own position is that no filtration device is needed for its supplied water. Most home treatment is decided on different grounds:
Hardness — the number the report doesn’t publish.
Hardness is a comfort and home-protection issue, not a regulated contaminant, so it does not appear in the report’s tables. Floridan Aquifer water carries dissolved calcium and magnesium from limestone; on the USGS scale, anything above 10.5 grains per gallon counts as “very hard,” and local published estimates for Toho-supplied homes commonly land in the hard range. The only figure that should size a softener is a current measurement at your home — a quick measurement, not an appointment with a salesperson.
Taste, odor and the shower.
The chlorine residual that keeps water safe is noticeable at the tap and in the shower, and aquifer water can carry a sulfur note that Toho treats by aeration. Whether that bothers your household is a preference, and it is yours to judge — no test result makes the decision for you.
What hardness does to a house.
Scale builds in water heaters, dishwashers, fixtures and shower glass over years. That slow cost — appliance life, cleaning, spots — is the practical case for softening, and it can be weighed without any scare tactics.
03 · The stricter yardstick
What the EWG sees in
the same water.
The Environmental Working Group’s Tap Water Database scores this same system (City of St. Cloud) against health guidelines that are deliberately stricter than the law. Its summary: five contaminants above EWG health guidelines — chlorate, haloacetic acids (HAA5 and HAA9), combined radium, and total trihalomethanes — and zero above legal limits. Both facts are true at once. A guideline exceedance is a stricter benchmark to be aware of, not a violation, and we present it the way EWG does rather than inflating it.
Published data.
Published price.
No kitchen-table test.
04 · How Oakline works
Why we publish this instead of
“testing” your water in person.
In this industry, the free in-home water test is usually the first act of a sales presentation: a few dramatic color changes, then a quote several times higher than the equipment warrants, revealed only at the end. We think that model is backwards. The underlying data about your water is already public — this page is the proof. When Oakline launches, the system and its installed price will be published the same way: up front, where you can read them without an appointment.
Already had your water tested by another company? If they left you results, we are glad to walk through them with you, line by line, the way we have done with the utility’s own report here. Bring the data; skip the pitch.
A few good questions
About the water,
not the pitch.
The questions this page usually raises.
Do I need a water test before buying a water softener?
No sales-visit test is needed. Your utility publishes its test results every year, and independent databases summarize them. The one number that matters for sizing a softener is a current hardness measurement at your home, which is a quick measurement, not a two-hour appointment.
Is St. Cloud tap water safe to drink?
Toho Water Authority’s 2025 report for the City of St. Cloud system shows no violations: every measured substance was within its federal or state legal limit. Home treatment is a separate question about taste, odor and what hard water does to plumbing and appliances.
Read the 2025 report yourselfWhy does my St. Cloud water taste or smell like chlorine?
Toho disinfects with chlorine to control microbes. Its 2025 St. Cloud report measured an average chlorine residual of 1.57 ppm (range 0.5–2.9 ppm) against a legal maximum of 4.0 ppm. That residual is what most people taste and smell, and it is the most common reason homeowners ask about carbon filtration.
Does Oakline do free in-home water tests?
No. In-home “free tests” in this industry are usually the first step of a sales presentation that ends with a multi-thousand-dollar quote. Oakline works from the utility’s published data and independent summaries instead. If another company has already tested your water and left you the results, we are glad to walk through them with you.
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Primary sources checked October 21, 2026: Toho Water Authority, 2025 Annual Water Quality Report — City of St. Cloud Water System (PWS ID 349-1373); Environmental Working Group Tap Water Database, City of St. Cloud profile. Reports describe their stated monitoring periods and the system as a whole, not the water at every individual tap. Oakline is independent of Toho Water Authority and the EWG. Oakline is in prelaunch planning and makes no equipment performance or certification claim on this page.