PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • August 4, 2025
There are three roadside springs — all in Oxford County — that the state regulates, testing monthly for contaminants. On weekends, people line up to fill containers of various sizes to bring home for drinking and cooking, whether they have concerns about what’s in their tap water, believe this has to be healthier for them or prefer the taste — often all three. There used to be more, maybe 150 statewide when the Legislature passed a law in the late 1970s exempting them from state regulation. Many are gone, covered by highway crews to prevent traffic hazards or shut down by property owners after the state tried to require regular testing earlier that decade. The state still oversees these three because they meet the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s definition of a public water supply.