A very important part of the sewage treatment process is "pretreatment" where industrial dischargers to our sewer systems either treat their waste before discharging to the sewer system or transport their most toxic waste products to other facilities for treatment so as not to cause damage to the treatment plants themselves or cause environmental impairment to our surface waters. Often funding for monitoring and enforcement of facilities discharging to sewer systems that require pretreatment is inadequate or lacking.

Here in Milwaukee, our sludge is made into "Milorganite" (stands for Milwaukee organic nitrogen), which is a low phosphorus, "natural" fertilizer that is used extensively in the Milwaukee area as well as sold throughout the country. Last weekend, it was found that fertilizer applied to isolated areas in 5 different Milwaukee County Parks on July 5th was contaminated with PCBs.