What Ocala's 2025 Water Quality Report Says
The city's annual report answers some questions well and skips others. Here's how to read it, and what to do if you're on a well and have no report at all.
The City of Ocala's 2025 report (PWS 342-0922) covers groundwater from six Upper Floridan Aquifer wells that is softened and chlorinated. It lists no violations: chlorine averaged 1.21 ppm, nitrate peaked at 1.8 ppm, and lead's 90th percentile was 0.7 ppb. It also lists 2024 PFAS sampling. It gives no hardness figure.
Source and treatment
The report describes water drawn from six source wells in the Upper Floridan Aquifer and softened and chlorinated for disinfection. In 2025 the Florida Department of Environmental Protection completed a source water assessment that identified 42 potential sources of contamination near the wells, rated from low to high concern; details are on FDEP's source water assessment site. The city's Compliance Monitoring Division runs its own water quality laboratory and handles the sampling.
Is this your report?
Only if the City of Ocala bills you for water. Marion County Utilities serves nearly 35,000 customers of its own and publishes separate reports, and other systems serve parts of the area too. Your bill names your supplier. If there's no water bill because the water comes from a well on your property, there's no report for you to read, and your own test results take its place.
The regulated results
- Chlorine: 1.21 ppm annual average (0.75 to 1.36), limit 4.0.
- Nitrate: up to 1.8 ppm, limit 10.
- Sodium: up to 10.2 ppm (2023 sampling).
- Arsenic: up to 0.73 ppb, limit 10.
- Fluoride: 0.15 ppm in June 2025.
- Disinfection byproducts: TTHM 16.7 ppb (limit 80), HAA5 3.6 ppb (limit 60).
- Lead and copper: 90th percentiles of 0.7 ppb and 0.012 ppm, with no sites over the action levels (2023 sampling).
Every row is marked no violation.
The PFAS table
A separate table lists unregulated contaminants from UCMR 5 sampling in January to July 2024, reported as the highest level at the point of entry. It includes PFOS at 39 ng/L, PFHxS at 42 ng/L and PFOA at 6.5 ng/L. The city says it is developing solutions to comply with EPA's PFAS rules by the EPA deadline of 2032. If you want to act at home first, the whole-house filtration page covers options.
What the report doesn't cover
There's no hardness number, because the city softens its water and hardness isn't a regulated contaminant. And if your home is on a private well, no report covers your water at all. FDOH's advice is to test for bacteria and nitrate at least once a year and lead every three years; the well water treatment page explains what to do with the results.
Ask for a free water test in Ocala
Say whether you're on a private well or city water and what you're noticing: smell, stains, scale or taste. A local water treatment specialist serving Ocala phones you back.