Linderoth at Lighthouse beach with Garcia, the proud first member of the public to receive a printed copy of the new report.
Wendy Garcia’s husband cringes whenever she takes the kids to Lighthouse Point Park’s beach.
She hopes he won’t cringe any longer when she shows him a new report that gave the waters around New Haven’s most popular ocean swimming spot an excellent grade for water quality as pertains to human health.
That news is contained in Save the Sound‘s Long Island Beach Report, which is now available online
After a walking tour and interview at the beach Friday Save the Sound Water Quality Program Manager Peter Linderoth gave a copy of the report to Garcia, which, she said, she is eager to show her husband.
The report, in an analysis of trends and testing over the last three years, shows that dozens of beaches in New York and Connecticut along the Sound, including New Haven’s Lighthouse Point and Fort Hale Park beaches, earned top grades for water quality.
The latter two both earned A minuses in 2018, C plusses in 2017, and As in 2016.
The discrepancy between the years didn’t bother him, Linderoth said, because the C year is surrounded by a pattern of good ratings for 2016 and 2018, and reveal merely the vagaries of the methodology.
That methodology has at its center a gathering of reports on fecal indicator data — both human and animal — as measured by local health departments during regular periodic testing throughout the year and before and after rainfalls.
New Haven Land Trust’s Schooner Camp.
Amid the good news was also an alarm: With frequent and heavier rainfalls, as a result of global warming, the beaches score far more poorly after downpours.
The heavy rainfalls wash fecal matter either from broken pipes or combined sewer overflows (CSOs), from the fields of farmers, or from pet owners who haven’t cleaned up after their pooches straight into the beaches and swimming areas.
The overall failure rate of beach samples more than doubled in wet weather, according to the report, jumping from 5.4 percent to 11.1 percent.
It’s possible, Linderoth said, that Lighthouse Point’s C plus in 2017 occurred in the wake of such an event. O perhaps a flock of geese set up camp around at the time of the measurement.
The overall trend both at the city’s local beaches and around the 204 beaches tested throughout the Long Island Sound area is very positive.
As we walked along the beach, by the play area, near the splash pad, and then along the perimeter of the designated swimming area Friday, Linderoth was at pains to point out that the measurements are taken only within the specific swimming area of the beach.
“Testing is very local,” he said. That might explain why Garcia reported to Linderoth that her pediatrician cautioned her not to let her kids play in the waters nearer to their home, off Woodward Avenue, near East Shore Park.
“It’d be challenging to take a beach grade as a measure of health up a river,” or at other points along the harbor, he added.
Nevertheless, he pronounced the Sound’s and New Haven’s beaches “fantastic” and said he, a swimmer of beaches in Fairfiled County where he lives, would be interested in trying out our waters.
He pointed out the absence of much infrastructure, that is buildings, in the immediate area of the Lighthouse Point beach because leaking pipes could contribute to problems. He also noted, with reassurance, the wide expanse of grass leading down to the beach, and also to the absence of pets on the sand. Garcia said her family’s experience is that if the life guard sees a dog on the beach, she makes sure it’s removed.
That made good sense to Linderoth.
According to the report, the chief sources of pollution are leaking and failing sanitary sewer infrastructure like pipes that fail in homes or businesses; combined sewer overflows; un-inspected and untended septic systems that overflow; and wildlife, pet, and livestock fecal matter washing into the beaches, especially after heavy rainfalls.
“With climate change we’re experiencing more rain, so we’re proactively talking to cities to take care of their storm water systems, and invest in it,” he said.
That New Haven has made some of those investments is likely one reason“this beach gets an A minus,” he added.
If you swim in below-grade water, he warned, you could end up with headaches, nausea and vomiting, pink eye, and hepatitis. The young and the elderly and those with compromised immune systems are most vulnerable, he said.
One of Linderoth’s main aims in getting the report out is so that people can help and monitor problems. Preventive measures include a city maintaining its infrastructure, minding the CSOs, and individuals installing rain barrels to catch the falling water and redirect it to gardens and to lawns.
“It is really beach-to-beach, not a finding for a whole region. However, over 90 percent of the samples [from 204 beaches] passed safe for swimming in the 2016 to 2018 period,” he said of the report.
Anyone who notices pollution at the beaches should work first with their city’s health department, Linderoth suggested, but also keep his office in the loop. Convey concerns through .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
After we circled back from chatting with Garcia, her ten-year-old daughter Raquel said the Lighthouse Beach waters are refreshing and she likes meet other kids on the beach who like swimming as she does.
“I love it here,” Linderoth said. “I’d like to come to swim.”