USA TODAY International Edition
Dirty beach list revised after errors found
Group: Changes don’t negate safety message
The environmental research group that issued a report last month on America’s dirtiest beaches said it found errors in the methodology and calculations. The result: Fewer beaches had problem bacteria levels last year than the group had said.
The biggest changes involve beaches in Great Lakes states, according to the revision released this month by the Environment America Research and Policy Center. The study focused on beaches with the most days of potentially unsafe levels of bacteria, primarily linked to fecal matter.
The group said the changes should not diminish the study’s importance.
“The report still has great value – and a big regret is the errors distracted from the overall message of the importance of protecting our water,” said John Rumpler, clean water program director for Environment America.
The study received widespread attention when it was released July 23. When the errors were discovered, Environment America removed the report from its website and reviewed its methodology. The new version posted Aug. 2.
Under the new calculations, 2,580 of 4,523 beach sites tested nationwide, about 57%, were found to have water pollution levels at least one day in 2018 that exceeded the strictest safety guidelines from the Environmental Protection Agency. That’s down from 2,627 beach sites in the earlier report.
Of those, 546 were found to be unsafe on at least 25% of the days they were tested, down from 610 in the initial report. The study is based on data collected from beaches in 29 Great Lakes and coastal states and Puerto Rico.
Environment America said its research arm, Frontier Group, made two fundamental errors in its analysis of water data submitted to the federal government. One was not taking into account that some agencies use a different measurement method for water sampling. The other was a calculation error involving the benchmark number for E. coli, one of the bacteria that come from human or animal feces.
The fundamental point of the study: Many beaches become unsafe at some point during a year, usually from waste from storm runoff and sewage overflows, Rumpler said. If those flows can be reduced, beaches stay cleaner on more days of the year.
“Our overall intention is to alert the public that our beaches are not as safe as they might assume, not as safe as they should be or not as safe as they can be,” Rumpler said.
The study was revised after authorities in some of the counties covered by the report raised questions about its veracity. The study was reported by USA TODAY and other news organizations around the country.
Chicago Park District, singled out as having problems at 19 beaches, said it believed the initial results were wrong, citing different testing methods.
Environment America agreed and changed its findings. The district said in a statement it is still “disappointed by the continued use of incorrect or skewed data that provides misleading information to the public.”
In particular, it said the report classifies Chicago beaches by a more stringent risk standard than is commonly used in Illinois or some other states. It said the report still contains “significant unexplained errors that falsely inflate the water quality advisory rate” on the beaches cited. Plus, the district said the report uses data sources that are not maintained by the EPA.
Tony Dutzik, associate director of the Frontier Group, said the study was based on data obtained through the national Water Quality Portal, a cooperative project sponsored by the U.S. Geological Survey, the EPA and the National Water Quality Monitoring Council.
The report initially said South Shore Beach beach in Cook County, Illinois, had potentially unsafe levels of bacteria on 93 of 98 testing days. Environment America’s revision puts the number of unsafe days at 38.
That’s still higher than what the Chicago Park District contended was 26 out of 100 sampling days. Environment America said it uniformly applied a tougher, but accepted, EPA testing benchmark. The benchmark is that beaches should be considered potentially unsafe when bacteria levels indicate a risk of 32 water-related illnesses among 1,000 swimmers on a particular day, Dutzik said. Some jurisdictions, he said, use a higher, still acceptable, benchmark.
The survey is still questionable in some regards. It may not include all beaches in the U.S. Rather, the results come only from beaches that are tested. Some beaches were tested a lot in 2018 and others a minimal amount. Kings Ferry in Chatham County, Georgia, for example, was tested only four days during the year – and it fell below the federal benchmark on three of those days.
Environment America was created as an offshoot of the U.S. Public Interest Research Group in 2007 to focus entirely on environmental issues.