Public Notification of Water Quality Results

The below article discusses the inconsistencies in public notification of beach monitoring results between three counties in New Jersey. There are similar inconsistencies nationwide, with some states posting or closing a beach after one bad (high bacteria) sample, and others only taking action after a second bad sample – often 2-3 days after the original sample. In California, although beaches are posted with health advisories after one bad sample, beaches are only closed if there is evidence of a sewer spill, regardless of the bacteria level. Other states, including New Jersey (except Monmouth County) and Florida only take action after a second sample. That action also varies by state – closure in NJ, an advisory in FL.

Water quality monitoring a top priority as rain gives way to clearing at beaches

Monmouth to post advisory if first test shows pollution; Ocean won't do same

By TODD B. BATES • ENVIRONMENTAL WRITER • June 2, 2010

It's a near picture-perfect day as the crew aboard the single-prop Cessna airplane looked for trouble in the

ocean below.

Outfitted with a light-based sensor to detect algae, which can cloud the water and lead to fish kills, the plane

gently cruises over the surf off Monmouth County.

As the plane flies past Manasquan Inlet, Virginia Loftin, a state research scientist, spots some floating trash

near the southern end.

"I don't know where that might have come from,'' said Loftin, a longtime state Department of Environmental

Protection staffer who oversees the state-county-local beach water monitoring program. "There's always

the possibility that some boater dumped his garbage.''

In some areas along the coast, the water looks foamy or brownish, perhaps from algae or churned up

sediment.

Overall, Loftin said the water "looks OK.''

With the 2010 beach season arriving this weekend, officials are monitoring the waters and hope oil from the BP

spill in the Gulf of Mexico doesn't spoil the summer.

There's a slight chance that oil could appear, probably in the form of tar balls, according to experts.

Meanwhile, both environmental activists and officials say beach-water quality in general depends on the

weather, with rainfall boosting pollution from runoff.

Again this year, Monmouth County will take the extra precaution of posting warning signs at beaches at

the first hint of pollution. But officials in Ocean and Cape May counties don't plan to follow Monmouth's lead.

Instead, they will follow state rules that call for two tests over 48 hours before action is taken. In short, this

means unwary swimmers risk exposure to harmful bacteria and viruses that can make them sick.

The most common illness from polluted waters is gastroenteritis, an inflammation of the stomach and

intestines that can cause vomiting, headaches and fever. Other minor illnesses include ear, eye, nose and

throat infections.

Martin Connie, principal registered environmental health specialist in the Atlantic City Health Department, said

he likes the idea of posting an advisory sign after one high count, and it would be considered.

Patricia Diamond, health officer in the Atlantic County Division of Public Health, said the oceanfront area

covered by the division has never gotten a second high bacteria count. But the division would ban bathing at a

beach after one high count if it believes there is a pollution problem, according to Diamond.

Late last summer, officials in Monmouth County began posting their own advisory signs at beaches after an

initial test showed high levels of fecal bacteria, indicators of potentially harmful pollution, in the water.

"That's, of course, what we've been calling for for years, and it's nice to see that it's finally happening,'' said

John Weber of Bradley Beach, a surfer and northeast regional manager for the Surfrider

Foundation, a nonprofit environmental group. "It's definitely more protective of the public health.''

William Simmons, environmental health coordinator in the Monmouth County Health Department, said the

four health agencies in the county that began posting signs last summer "got nothing but positive feedback from

the public.''

Activists want state officials to better protect beachgoers from polluted water and increase monitoring. Officials say

they're working on amendments to state rules and looking into additional monitoring.

In Monmouth County last year, officials closed various beaches to swimming a total of 114 times,

according to the DEP. If, for example, five beaches were closed just for a day, that would count as five lost

beach days.

Nearly all of the swimming bans … 108 … were precautionary after rainfall at four beaches near the ocean outfall from polluted Wreck Pond in Spring Lake and Sea Girt.

In Ocean County, no ocean beaches had to be closed to swimming due tobacteria.

But a beach in Long Beach Township was closed for three days as a precaution after a pleasure boat sank,

releasing debris, according to the DEP. And an Island Beach State Park beach was closed for a day as a precaution

after an unarmed torpedo washed up.

Some of the many bay beaches in Monmouth and Ocean counties were closed for a day a total 56 times last

year, largely because of high bacteria levels or as a precaution following rain.

Beachwater testing

Under the state-coordinated Cooperative Coastal Monitoring Program, county and local health

officials take ocean, bay and tidal river samples on Mondays and results come back the next day.

If levels of fecal enterococci bacteria hit more than 104 per 100 milliliters of water at a beach, officials take more

samples and results come back in 24 hours. If bacteria levels remain high, officials close the beach to swimming

until counts drop.Last year, four health agencies in Monmouth County asked the state Department of Health and Senior

Services to amend its rules covering beachwater testing to allow officials to post advisory signs warning of pollution.

The agencies include the county health department, Monmouth County Regional Health Commission No. 1 and the Long Branch and Middletown health departments.

Agency officials thought a 48-hour wait to close a beach was too long, said Simmons, of the county health

department.

In July, the DEP said state health department rules do not prohibit local health agencies from posting

advisories at bathing beaches.

Loftin, the DEP research scientist, said it's up to county and local health departments to decide whether to post

advisory signs. But the DEP supports health agencies that choose to do so, she said.

In Ocean County, however, officials do not plan to post advisories at beaches after getting initial high

counts of bacteria, said Leslie Terjesen, county health department spokeswoman.

"We follow the (state) code,'' she said. "We don't close the beaches. The municipalities close the beaches'' after

two days of high counts.

Meanwhile, the state health department has "not yet offered local health departments any guidance on

the upcoming beach season but plan to do so before the season begins,'' according to spokeswoman MarilynRiley.

As of last week, the department had not issued any guidance.

The department's goal is to propose rule amendments by late summer or early fall, she said in an email.

Cindy Zipf, executive director of Clean Ocean Action, a Sandy Hook-based environmental coalition, said "The

program we have right now is woefully inadequate. The old rules can literally make you sick because.... They're not

providing full information in a timely manner.''

This story originally published First

In Print in the May 30, 2010 edition

of The Sunday Press.

Todd B. Bates: 732-643-4237;

tbates@app.com; www.twitter.

com/ToddBBatesAPP

Collecting Information on Ocean Illness in New Jersey

The Jersey Shore Chapter of the Surfrider Foundation has recently added an ocean illness form to their website to complement their BWTF water testing program. Joe Mairo, a Surfrider member and high school biology teacher that leads one of the Chapter's student run water testing programs, speaks to the local media about the new website and the chapter's experience with local incidences of illness caused by exposure to polluted water. Story below.

NJ biology teacher finds high bacteria levels in water near Wreck Pond, documents results online

By MaryAnn Spoto/The Star-Ledger

April 20, 2010, 5:31PM

WRECK POND -- It started with a small cut on his right leg.

A day after he went surfing in Asbury Park, Joe Mairo’s leg began to swell. Two days later, he was in the hospital with a serious staph infection.

Although Mairo has no proof, he can’t help but wonder if the cloudy water in which he was surfing that October day last year caused his infection.

For decades, surfers like Mairo have long suspected they’ve contracted all kinds of illnesses from their exposure to high levels of fecal coliform. Now they want to document their experiences on the internet to try to prove their theory.

"I remember sitting in the water and thinking ‘this is gross,’" the 32-year-old Bradley Beach resident said. "All those variables are out there for what I had, so it makes me a little unsure. (But) there are other cases where it’s really clear-cut."

Mairo said he can’t definitively link his illness — which turned out to be a MRSA infection — to the ocean water because he worked out at the same high school gym where wrestlers also had the methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus infection.

But Mairo, a biology and environmental science teacher at Wall Township High School, said some of his students have had more convincing cases, including ear infections or nausea almost immediately after surfing.

As part of the class curriculum, Mairo and his students conduct water-quality testing on samples taken from the ocean in Sea Girt and Spring Lake near an outfall pipe that flows from nearby Wreck Pond. The pond has had so many instances of high levels of fecal coliform that the state Department of Environmental Protection automatically closes beaches near the pond in the summer after heavy rainfalls as a precaution.

The students’ testing, conducted during the months the local health departments don’t test, occasionally have shown high levels of the bacteria.

"We definitely see when water temperatures are up and we get a rain, the bacteria levels are high," he said.

So Mairo suggested the Surfrider Foundation, of which he is a member, start a website at njoceanillness.org to collect the experiences of surfers and other people who suspect they’ve gotten sick from exposure to high fecal coliform levels.

With the website, the group will be able to determine whether any patterns emerge and present the evidence to state and local officials, said John Weber, the foundation’s East Coast regional manager.

To weed out phony stories, the donors have to identify themselves and be willing to testify to their experiences, Mairo said.

Weber said the advocacy group has heard anecdotes for years about surfers’ illnesses, from sore throats to ear infections and even worse, but noted there haven’t been any attempts to document them

"State and local health departments aren’t collecting it, so the (New Jersey) chapter is going to,’’ he said.

Blue Water Task Force - Bringing Together Rival High Schools

Students from two rival New Jersey high schools are teaming up to test local waters through Surfrider Foundation’s Blue Water Task Force program. The environmental clubs of both Wall Township High School and Manasquan High School are testing the waters in and around Wreck Pond. Both towns are in the Wreck Pond watershed in coastal Monmouth County, NJ. Jersey Shore Chapter activist and science teacher at Wall, Joe Mairo, put the program together and Tom Glenn of Manasquan brought on his students.

The beaches near Wreck Pond are closed more frequently than any other beaches in NJ. The shallow, algae-filled pond is over populated with waterfowl and if it rains just 1/10th of an inch, the beach is closed preemptively. The pond once flowed freely to the ocean and was occasionally flushed by high tides and storms. But it was closed off to the ocean decades ago with only a man-made flume draining it. It just goes to show what can happen when you interrupt natural processes.

“We chose Wreck Pond because its notoriously bad water quality has affected beaches in the area for years,” said Mairo. The state has done a lot of work on extending the pond’s flume, but there is an indication that the pollution problems still exists.”

Other students helping with this project are Manasquan High School seniors Lee Kresge, Phil Lewis, and Veronica Impellizeri, and Wall High School Student Jessica Krug.

The Chapter received a grant from the Linus A. Gilbert Foundation with the help of Wachovia Bank Charitable Services to cover the cost of the testing. At the end of the school year, both sets of students will report their findings to the local chapter. The chapter may in turn make those findings known to the local environmental commissions or town councils. That data may help decide if the $5million the state spent on extending the flume was worth it.

Originally posted by John Weber in Making Waves, vol 23/no. 3

Jersey Shore's BWTF Investigates Wreck Pond

Monmouth County teens care for local waters
Posted by the Asbury Park Press on 02/24/07 by TODD B. BATES,
ENVIRONMENTAL WRITER

Cousins Kelsey and Rachel Clayton, students at Wall High School, took their first-ever ocean water samples Tuesday near the outfall from polluted Wreck Pond in southern Monmouth County. The samples then were brought to a school lab to check fecal bacteria levels, according to Joe Mairo, a biology teacher at the school.

Manasquan High School students also are taking water samples — from three spots around Wreck Pond — as part of the project, said Thomas Glenn, a chemistry and science teacher at the high school. "It's kind of cool because the kids are excited about it and it kind of gives them a window into (the field of environmental science)," Glenn said.

Wreck Pond, which separates Spring Lake and Sea Girt, has been the source of most of New Jersey's ocean swimming bans during recent beach seasons. And the students are learning about what it's like to test the waters and about the local environment, according to Mairo.

The Jersey Shore chapter of the Surfrider Foundation, a nonprofit grass-roots environmental group, is sponsoring the project, which is funded by a $3,000 grant from the Wachovia Charitable Services Group, Mairo said. The project is part of the Surfrider Foundation's Blue Water Task Force program, which involves water quality monitoring, education and advocacy.

On Tuesday, Kelsey Clayton, a 17-year-old senior at Wall High School, and her cousin, Rachel Clayton, 15, a freshman there, took two ocean water samples. Both are members of the school's Environmental Club. They took one sample north of the new, 300-foot outfall pipe from the pond and the other sample south of the pipe. The air temperature was in the 50s, in sharp contrast to the 30s the day before, according to a National Weather Service Web site.

"We're just excited to give them the experience . . . in the lab and the field, especially on a day like today," said Mairo, 29, of Bradley Beach, a faculty adviser to the environmental club, along with science teacher Bob Dillon.

The girls used an approximately 10-foot-long pole to collect the samples, according to Mairo, a surfer and board member of the Jersey Shore chapter. "They don't have to . . . worry about getting wet or falling in or anything like that," he said.

The sampling, which began last month, is to continue through June and may continue next school year, he said.
"We're trying to do it twice a month," Mairo said.

Samples taken last month revealed a low level of fecal bacteria on the north side of the pipe and a moderate level on the south side. Samples grabbed on Tuesday revealed a moderate bacteria level north of the pipe and a low level south of it, Mairo said.

Kelsey Clayton said she's been a member of the Environmental Club since freshman year. "I enjoy being outside," she said. "I just wanted to join a club that helped."

Kelsey, who wants to be a pilot and has been accepted at five colleges, all aeronautical schools, said she's interested in environmental issues and would like to study the topic in college. She's writing an English paper on global warming, she said. She's also taking a horticulture class and growing peas and strawberries.

Rachel Clayton said she joined the environmental club "just to get involved in school and . . . helping the environment is kind of something I'm interested in."

"I like the outdoors," she said.

Manasquan High School seniors Lee Kresge, Phil Lewis and Veronica Impellizeri are taking samples from Wreck Pond weekly, said Glenn, an environmental science major in college and faculty adviser to that school's Environmental Club. "A lot of the kids who are in my club are really thinking of going into environmental science," said Glenn, 30, of Point Pleasant. The sampling project "kind of gives them . . . a real world application," he said.

"It's a very small window compared to some of the things you're going to do (in the environmental field)," he said.