Lake Erie Water Danger
Dated: 08/03/2006
Lake Erie swimmers are finding more and more signs popping up on the beach warning of unsafe water. The Ohio Environmental Council says the bacteria levels have gotten out of control and something has to be done.
Already this summer at Camp Perry Beach, which is just a few miles West of Port Clinton, nine warning signs have been put up that the water isn't safe.
"It's very important for residents to know because you're swimming in raw sewage," said David Celebrezze, Ohio Environmental Council. "Some of this bacteria includes E.Coli, Hepatitis A, Cryptosporidium, and Giardia. They're parasites and bacteria and can be very harmful to us."
Celebrezze says the parasites and bacteria are coming from combined sewage overflow.
"What that is... is after a heavy rain or a quick snow melt our sewer infrastructure can't handle that amount of water coming through," said Celebrezze.
So it overflows into the tributaries of Lake Erie, and ends up at beaches just like Camp Perry. Dozens of others have also been affected, including Maumee Bay State Park where there's been 10 warning signs this summer. Celebrezze says the scary thing is those signs can take up to 24 hours to post.
"So while you are out swimming or your kids are swimming they could be swimming in raw sewage," said Celebrezze.
"We're concerned about that obviously from a health perspective but also an environmental perspective because Lake Erie is also a habitat for thousands of animals," said Celebrezze.
So the Ohio Environmental Council is lobbying Washington for funding to help fix the problem. The money would update area sewer systems and help clean-up beaches.
Ottawa County has already been given a 2.6-million dollar grant which Western Lake Erie Waterkeeper, Sandy Bihn, says gives hope.
"These are just great waters to be in and great waters to enjoy and many people come here and we want to share it with them," said Bihn. "We want to clean-up these problems so they can have access to the water and have fun."
You can find a complete list of Lake Erie beaches and the bacteria levels at this website: www.odh.ohio.gov/odhPrograms/eh/bbeach/beach_samplemonitoring.aspx
To find out more about the effort to clean-up Lake Erie you can find information on both of these websites:
www.TheOEC.org and www.WesternLakeErie.org
