Its been about about a month since residents of East Chicago, Indiana, were told they should not drink their tap water without filtering it.

The Environmental Protection Agency said actionable levels of lead had been found in the citys water supply and warned residents to use certified filters until further notice.

The discovery was yet another setback for a city already dealing with lead and arsenic levels in soil surrounding a Superfund waste site that are so high that Gov. Eric Holcomb declared an emergency disaster .

Advocates say state and city officials arent doing enough to keep residents safe from the multiple ways they can be exposed to toxic lead. A coalition that includes the Natural Resources Defense Council, local organizations and East Chicago residents on Thursday issued a petition urging the EPA to launch a comprehensive emergency response to the citys crisis.

The petition calls for the EPA to immediately provide East Chicago residents with free faucet filters and bottled water, and to ensure the filters are installed correctly. The coalition also called for blood testing for children younger than 7, who are at high risk of lead exposure, and expanded water testing for more households than the EPA sampled last year.

Nobody should be forced to endure contaminated water, Anjali Waikar, a staff attorney at the NRDC, told HuffPost. Were asking for temporary, short-term relief to ensure that people arent consuming contaminated water and asking for the agency to provide these basic life necessities until the situation is resolved.

EPA officials did not respond to a request for comment.

The petition arrives at a time of upheaval at the EPA under President Donald Trump . Reports emerged this week that the agencys budget could be cut as much as 24 percent . Many programs targeted for cuts could affect cleanup efforts in East Chicago.

The EPAs brownfields program could be slashed 44 percent, or $11 million, according to reports, and the agencys state grant programs for drinking water and lead are listed for 30-percent reductions. EPA compliance and civil enforcement programs could see large cuts, too.