Well, it looks like a vote will be on the California November ballot to rename a San Francisco sewage plant after President Bush. Personal opinions aside, I would simply like to comment on the number of articles I have come across about this subject. Over a hundred articles came up when I did a simple news search, and my sewage news alert has been flooded with them for weeks. Frankly, I'm a little tired of it. Appropriate or not, it grates on my nerves when there are more articles about a sewage joke than a sewage spill. It seems that we need to have our priorities readjusted, and quickly.

And now, the Spills of the Week...

Picking up the Slack: Residents of Mystic, Connecticut, are finally taking matters into their own hands and working to clear the water of the New London County harbors. Faced with the State's lack of funding to adequately enforce the boat sewage dumping ban, a local environmental group, Coastal Environmental Services, has begun offering a free pumping service. Workers from the group will bring a pumping boat out on the water, and clear any tanks that need emptying, free of charge. I find it unfortunate that the sate of Connecticut can't fund its own laws, but at least in this case, someone is there to pick up the slack. And good thing too; according to local resident people have reported seeing a "resident yacht emptying out their holding tank and people were swimming a 100 yards away." It
brings whole new meaning to swimming in murky waters.
- July 18, 2008. News Channel Eight - New Haven, CT

Ritzy Ruckus: An upscale Seattle hotel on Elliot Bay has been inadvertently leaking sewage and laundry water in to Puget Sound since Friday evening, according to a local report. The sewer line connecting to the hotel ruptured after it separated from the pier due to broken mounting brackets. The brackets had slowly been degraded by the salt water in the Sound and finally gave in. A temporary line was scheduled to be installed under the pier, where the hotel is located, by Monday night. A more permanent fix will take some more time as workers can only access the pipeline during high tides. But both officials and hotel managers are eager to do what they can. "We wanted to do what's right," says Rudy Sharp, the hotel's managing director. "More than most businesses - because of our location - we know how important the environment is and take this very seriously."
- July 21, 2008. The Seattle Times - Seattle, WA

People Problem: This blog spends a lot of time attempting to show how sewage spills can affect the life and health of the communities they occur in. People need to know when these things happen. But what about when the people are the problem? An as yet unknown amount of raw sewage was spilled into Buck Creek in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Tuesday due to an intentional clog in a pipe. A man hole was pried up, and the pipe filled with tree limbs and branches, causing the pipe to clog and overflow, until someone noticed and reported the spill. The manhole has since been bolted shut, and tests are being done on the water to assess the danger to human health, but the fact remains that someone intentionally did this. Yes, this is one example out of dozens, most of them having to do with broken infrastructure and old systems, but we're not completely blameless. I've reported now two stories of logs and branches clogging systems, not to mention large amounts of grease, all caused by the ‘innocent' public. We have a responsibility too, and being this clueless is not an option.
-July 23, 2008. Grand Rapids Press - Grand Rapids, MI

Small Failures: Power outages across Iowa caused not one but three spills this week, as heavy wind and rain caused pumping stations to fail, and bypass sewage into local tributaries of the Mississippi River. Ranging from a small 500-1,000 gallon spill in Buffalo to a more than 1 million gallon spill in Burlington, one thing is sure, "It's important for cities and towns to plan for emergencies, including power outages." Chuck Correll, head of the Department of Natural Resources water quality bureau has uttered the understatement of the century. How can a simple power outage be responsible for millions of gallons of sewage being released into the Mississippi? I thought that we'd already invented emergency generators, so why aren't we using them? Pumping stations are once again online, but the fact remains that a simple wind storm and a dropped power line caused an amount of damage out of proportion to the problem. What a disgrace.
- July 22, 2008. Quad City Times - Davenport, IA

Grand Fiasco: A new waste treatment plant in Thibodaux, Louisiana, was approved by local residents to as a way to resolve issues over a more than 50 year old previous plant that was no longer up to code. However, the new plant has been nothing but trouble. Lacking a backup generator that it is required to have by law, the plant fails every time the power goes out, sending raw sewage into local houses and yards. The mandatory generator, costing approximately $50,000, was simply not budgeted into the cost of building the plant, and therefore never installed. "There were so many issues that we were dealing with," says Terry Dantin, Chairman of the board of the sewer district, in response to this phenomenal lapse in judgment. It's really comforting to know that your city planners lack good planning skills, eh? And not only that, but the plant has begun to make a loud, unidentified, vibrating racket, between 10pm and noon the next day, making it impossible to sleep. No one at the plant has any idea where it is coming from. Yet is anyone doing anything about this fiasco? No. The Department of Environmental Quality, well aware of the plant's violations and problems, will not pursue the issue until a resident files a formal complaint, a lengthy and time consuming process, no doubt. Maybe they're too tired from the lack of sleep!
- July 22, 2008. The Daily Comet - Lafourche Parish, LA