Lead-Safe Wisconsin: Lead Investigation FAQs

For information on how to amend a risk assessment report, see the 2024 Regulatory Update.

If there are no children under the age of 6 present, collect the background information using the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Questionnaire Form 5.0, page 5-99 in the Guidelines for the Evaluation and Control of Lead-Based Paint Hazards in Housing (2012 edition), Chapter 5: Risk Assessment and Reevaluation (PDF) and answer questions 5-16.

Simply state under the occupant use patterns section that due to no children living at or visiting the home (or the dwelling is vacant), there are no occupant use patterns that may cause lead-based paint exposure for a child under 6 years of age at this time.

No. You can note paint condition as just intact or deteriorated.

The type of deterioration (for example, chalking, chipping, and peeling) may provide information on the cause of the paint deterioration, but it is not required to include in your risk assessment report.

No. While HUD suggests non-play areas with less than 9 square feet of bare soil don't need to be samples,

Wisconsin Admin. Code ch. DHS 163 is more protective and does not have a de minimis for soil. Therefore, since the stricter standards of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Department of Health Services (DHS) rule are in effect in Wisconsin, any area of bare soil should be sampled.

No. Dust wipes are always required in a risk assessment. While the HUD Guidelines for the Evaluation and Control of Lead-Based Paint Hazards in Housing(2012 edition) do allow for the presumption of dust hazards,

Wisconsin Admin. Code ch. DHS 163 is more stringent and does not allow for the presumption of dust hazards.

No. Dust wipes are used to determine if there is a lead dust hazard and not to determine if the component tested has lead-based paint.

For example, the dust on the floor near a door might be coming from the door, the floor, tracked in from the soil or from another source.

An elevated blood lead level (EBL) investigation includes a risk assessment but may expand to include other possible sources of lead exposure. That may include testing personal items (for example, furniture, toys, and spices) that could expose the child to lead. An EBL investigation may also involve risk assessments of other locations where the child spends time (for example, other family members' homes and childcare settings).

For more information on elevated blood lead level investigations, visit Lead-Safe Wisconsin: Public Health Interventions for Lead Poisoning.

All areas should be assessed since the child could use it in the future as they develop and become more mobile. A child who is 1–2 years old will not have the same use patterns as a 5-year-old child.

All rooms and areas must be visually assessed for lead hazards, and tested accordingly, even if children under 6 years of age do not currently use the area. If you cannot access a room or do a complete visual assessment (for example, room is locked, personal items block your view such as a dresser placed in front of the closet door), document the reason in your field notes so you can include it in your report.

For more information on elevated blood lead level investigations, visit Lead-Safe Wisconsin: Public Health Interventions for Lead Poisoning.

No. We do not recommend including cost estimates for the following reasons:

• Accuracy: Most risk assessors are not lead contractors and may not align with other contractors' cost for labor and material. It would be very hard to provide an estimate for another person's work.
• Conflict of interest: Providing a cost estimate may raise questions about conflict of interest and the objectivity of your risk assessment.
• Confusion: Including the cost estimate in the risk assessment may be confusing for the dwelling owner. If you provided them with a cost estimate, they may think you can do the work for that amount or they may be shocked when other estimates do not come in near the same amount as your cost estimate.

The contractor is required to either close or seal all door sand windows during exterior lead work.

If exterior lead work is done without sealing off the window troughs (for example, storm windows are not present and windows were not sealed with plastic), the contractor must clean the window troughs.

The person doing the clearance must resample troughs as part of the exterior clearance.

It depends. If building openings are not sealed or closed during exterior work, lead dust can get inside.

Conduct an interior clearance even if the interior already passed clearance.

It depends. Exterior windowsills do not have dust clearance standards, but a window trough sample may be necessary if:

• A window in the exterior work area does not have a solid sashed storm window or plastic sealing off the trough. Without this barrier separating the interior from exterior work, you should sample window troughs.
  A minimum of four troughs would be sampled. If one fails, then another clearance attempt would sample the trough that failed and three more troughs, if present.
• A window sash or door was open during the work and exposed the interior. Then a full interior clearance protocol is needed.

During additional clearance attempts, you need to test the surfaces that failed and any other untested like surfaces—at least four total or until all surfaces are tested, if there are less than four present.

If floors failed the initial clearance but windows passed, you would only need to resample the surfaces that failed—in this example, you would only need to resample floors. Sample all the floors that failed and any additional un-sampled floors to meet the requirement of four rooms being sampled, if present.

For each room you will sample, alternate between collecting a window sample from the windowsill or the trough. So if you collect samples in four rooms where both sills and troughs are present, you should sample two windowsills and two troughs.

If the work area was contained to only one room, sample both a windowsill and a trough, if present.

Under Wis. Admin. Code ch. DHS 163, a porch is an unenclosed structure at or near ground level with a roof and a floor. Porch floors have a dust clearance standard of less than 40 micrograms per square foot (< 40 µg/ft² ).

A three-season room, sometimes referred to as an enclosed porch, is not a porch under this definition, as the interior dust lead clearance levels apply.

You are not required to sample porch floors during a clearance. According to the HUD Guidelines for the Evaluation and Control of Lead-Based Paint Hazards in Housing (2012 edition), Chapter 15: Clearance (PDF) (page 15-26), sampling porch floors is optional. Porch floors have a dust clearance standard of less than 40 micrograms per square foot (< 40 µg/ft²).

Since the work was not completed to the scope of work, stop the clearance examination as it failed the visual inspection. Do not collect dust wipe samples. Determine if there were changes to work orders that were not provided to you.

If the work was not completed to the scope of work and the residents need to be back in the dwelling before the work can be completed (for example, long material delays or changes in abatement contractor doing the work), you can seek an Approved Alternative to an Administrative Requirement (Wis. Admin. Code § DHS 163.02(2)) prior to conducting a clearance for habitation before the completion of the project.

While DHS has 20 days to process the request, we do understand the urgency to get a family back in their home and would try to approve an alternative that is as protective as the rule as soon as possible.

This can be submitted by the risk assessor or the client by sending an email to dhsasbestoslead@dhs.wisconsin.gov.

Requests for approval of an alternative to a requirement must be in writing and explain:

• The part of the rule you are seeking an alternative to.
• The reason for the request.
• The steps that will be taken to protect human health (the alternative must be as protective as the part of the rule).
• That clearance will be conducted, and must pass, after both stages of the project for the residents to return after each stage.

Yes. When snow prohibits the visual inspection of the exterior clearance, it is acceptable to postpone this step without prior approval from the Department of Health Services (DHS). You must:

• Verify all work is complete.
• Inspect areas not covered by snow (for example, clearance of interior work) to verify that no dust, debris, or residue is preset.
• Note in your clearance report that you did not complete the visual inspection of the exterior due to snow cover.
• Return to conduct the exterior clearance as soon as the ground is free of snow.

Please see BEOH Memo 2024-02: Conducting Clearance in Stages Due to Snow Cover for more information.

The dwelling owner's contact information (name, address, and phone number) is required in lead inspection and risk assessment reports.

In some instances, a phone number for the owner of a rental property may not be available. If you try and are still unable to find the dwelling owner's phone number, be sure to make a note in the report and list the method tenants use to contact the landlord or landlord's representative.

Consider asking the tenants who they call when there is an emergency to find the phone number for the landlord or land's representative.

Yes. The full report form the lab, including cover page, must be included in your report.

We recommend having separate scopes of work for interior and exterior lead work when possible. This will allow:

• Clearance to be conducted separately for interior or exterior.
• Clearance examiners to easily determine that all work has been completed.
• The residents to return to the dwelling after the interior has passed clearance and exterior work remains.

Note: Additional interior clearances may be required if work "breaking the envelope of the house" is not conducted with the first stage of work. Refer to the Clearance FAQs listed above for more information.