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Whitman Provides Funds to Connecticut for Beach Water Monitoring

Release Date: 07/26/2002
Contact Information: Peyton Fleming, EPA Press Office, 617-918-1008

EAST LYME, CT - Flanked by state and local officials at Rocky Neck State Park in East Lyme, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Christie Whitman today announced a $226,000 grant to the state of Connecticut to enhance Connecticut’s beach water quality monitoring program and public notification at Rocky Neck State Park and other state and local beaches across the state.

The grant was awarded to the Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection and the Connecticut Department of Public Health which oversee the state’s beach monitoring programs at coastal and inland beaches.

“As Americans head to the beach this summer, EPA wants to ensure that beach water is safe for swimming and other recreational activities,” Whitman said, at a news conference today. “Long Island Sound beaches draw millions of residents and tourists each summer. Today’s grant will help ensure that these visitors get what they are looking for – clean and safe swimming water backed by frequent water quality monitoring.”

Five million dollars of beach monitoring grants have been awarded so far this summer to coastal states around the country, including more than $1 million to New England’s five coastal states. A total of $10 million will be awarded nationally by the end of the summer.

The funding was made possible by the federal Beach Act approved by Congress in 2000. The grant funds will be used to monitor disease-causing microorganisms in beach waters and to warn beach goers when bacteria levels are high enough to show that waters may be unsafe for swimming.

“Visitors to Connecticut’s beaches are the real beneficiaries of Connecticut’s nationally recognized beach monitoring program. They can feel comfortable that they are swimming at a beach where the water has been tested and is safe for everyone to enjoy,” said DEP Commissioner Arthur J. Rocque Jr., who joined Whitman this morning at Rocky Neck State Park. “With the assistance of this grant, Connecticut will continue to strengthen its beach monitoring program, ensuring safe swimming areas while enhancing public awareness as to the status of the state’s beaches.”

Last year individual Connecticut state coastal beaches were closed for a total of eight days while municipal beaches were closed more than 200 days. Rocky Neck State Park did not have any closures last summer, but it has been closed twice this summer for a total of five days.

DEP and DPH will target the new $226,000 to integrate municipal beaches into a state-administered sampling and public notification plan for the entire state. The beach grant will help establish a courier service to bring municipal beach samples to the Health Department’s central laboratory in Hartford. This will improve the consistency and reliability of sampling analysis. In addition, DEP is spearheading the development of a web site that will integrate and communicate beach monitoring results from both state and municipal beaches to the public more rapidly.

Joining Whitman in East Lyme was EPA New England Regional Administrator Robert W. Varney, who announced a Clean New England Beaches Initiative for Connecticut and the other four coastal states in the region. The initiative includes the beach monitoring program discussed by Whitman as well as an increased focus on pollution assessment work and designating nearly a dozen “Flagship” beaches across the region that will serve as models for improving beach water quality. Rocky Neck State Beach and New London’s municipal Ocean Beach were the flagship beaches selected in Connecticut.

“While our beaches are dramatically cleaner than they were 20 years ago, we still have too many beaches in New England that are closed on too many days in the summer due to pollution,” Varney said, noting that 274 New England saltwater and freshwater beaches were closed at least one day last summer due to pollution.

EPA’s Clean New England Beaches Initiative includes the following five elements, all aimed at reducing pollution at coastal beaches:

• provide federal beach grants to boost water quality monitoring, pollution assessments and public notification about water quality
• provide technical assistance - and, where appropriate, enforcement support – to local and state agencies to identify and reduce pollution sources, focusing primarily on non-point pollution sources
• identify high-use “Flagship” beaches in each of the region’s coastal states for targeted attention through enhanced beach monitoring, assessments and pollution management
• promote high-quality monitoring, assessment technologies and information sharing through a newly-created state/federal Beach Work Group on Closures and Monitoring
• boost public involvement and education about water quality issues at coastal beaches