Suffolk CO, NY; "Every Water Body Listed As Impaired; Dead Rivers, Closed Beaches, Algal Blooms" [View all]

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OAKDALE, N.Y. — The Great South Bay, flanked by Fire Island and the South Shore of Long Island, once produced half the shellfish consumed in the United States, and supported 6,000 jobs in the early 1970s. Since then, the health of the bay has declined. Housing development meant more septic tanks depositing more nitrogen in the ground. The nitrogen flowed to rivers and the Great South Bay, leading to algae blooms. It depleted salt marshes that serve as fish habitat and suppressed oxygen levels. One result is that the shellfish industry has all but collapsed. The annual harvest of hard clams, for example, has fallen more than 90 percent since 1980.

After sweeping legislation that Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo signed in April, Suffolk County and other local governments in New York are hoping to deal with their aging — or absent — sewer lines, drinking water systems and other water infrastructure. The law, the Clean Water Infrastructure Act, allocates $2.5 billion to a variety of projects, as concerns about the safety of drinking water are growing.

Across the United States, impressive gains in water quality were made in the decades after passage of the Clean Water Act of 1972. But courts have generally ruled that the federal law was designed to address surface water contamination, and are divided about its application to tainted groundwater. As a result, problems from industrial pollution and untreated sewage have persisted.

The water quality problem is acute in Suffolk County. With 360,000 septic systems, Suffolk has roughly the same number as all of New Jersey. For years, nitrogen from leaky septic tanks has seeped into groundwater and eventually into rivers and bays. “What we have been doing for decades is just managing the decline of water quality,” said Steven Bellone, the Suffolk County executive. “Every water body is listed as impaired. We have dead rivers, closed beaches, harmful algal blooms.”

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https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/08/nyregion/dead-rivers-closed-beaches-an-acute-water-crisis-on-long-island.html?_r=0