SUFFOLK CLOSEUP - Honesty In Sewering

SUFFOLK CLOSEUP

By Karl Grossman

There was a partial win for major sewer construction in Suffolk County last week—two projects promoted by Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone were approved, one in Mastic and Shirley and the other in Babylon Town. Voters in Great River, however, rejected what was to be a third project.

The Mastic-Shirley and Babylon Town projects would be the first major sewer undertakings in Suffolk since the corruption-riddled $1.1 billion Southwest Sewer District project 50 years ago.

The Mastic-Shirley project is being made possible by $191.3 million in federal and state grants which in the referenda last week voters in those communities accepted. They will have to pay an annual sewer tax estimated at $430. The project in Babylon Town is made possible by $140.2 million in grants that voters in the communities of West Babylon, North Babylon and Wyandanch voted to accepted. They’d pay an annual sewer tax estimated at $532.

The Great River project would have been enabled by $26.4 million in federal and state grants which voters there rejected They would have been charged an estimated $755 yearly sewer tax.

The grants are being given by the state and federal governments based on the claim by Suffolk County post-Superstorm Sandy that sewers are necessary to provide “resiliency” to the county’s shoreline. They would, it’s claimed, assist in the growth of wetlands that would serve to counter storm surges. 

If the costs for the sewer construction are higher than anticipated, “the projects would go in front of the Suffolk Legislature,” according to an account in Newsday. 

In 1969 voters in the southwestern portion of Suffolk voted for the Southwest Sewer District. The project spiraled in price and was mired in corruption becoming one of the biggest scandals ever in Suffolk. The scandal brought down the administration of County Executive John V. N. Klein of Smithown.

With the scandal central to his campaign, then Islip Town Supervisor Peter F. Cohalan challenged Mr. Klein in a Republican primary for re-nomination for county executive and won and then won in the general election. Mr. Cohalan’s campaign slogan called on GOP voters to “Flush Klein.” (Mr. Cohalan is now Suffolk County historian.)

There was an array of investigations and indictments. Then Suffolk DA Patrick Henry, in taking action, spoke of how “we must prevent the cost of corruption, graft, kickbacks and payoffs from breaking the financial backs of our citizenry.”

Importantly, “the Southwest Sewer District was envisioned as the first phase of a sewer network that would extend north through Melville and east through Brookhaven [Town] to the Hamptons,” noted Long Island Business News in 2006 in an article about how, “The memory of the Southwest Sewer District is so potent that candidates who mention sewers still go down in defeat.”

But with Mr. Bellone, there was a dramatic change. Since his election seven years ago he has emphatically pushed sewering in Suffolk. He has declared: “Nitrogen pollution is public enemy number one for our bays, waterways, drinking supply, and the critical wetlands and marshes that protect us from natural disasters like Superstorm Sandy…More than 300,000 homes in Suffolk County are not sewered and are contributing nearly 70 percent of the pollution.”

But there has been controversy over his stand. Kevin McAllister, founding president of the Sag Harbor-based organization Defend H20, has pointed to advanced denitirication systems that can be added to cesspools as a substitute in most areas of Suffolk for sewers. He has repeatedly charged that Mr. Bellone’s sewer push is for economic development—with Mr. Bellone seeking sewers because reliance on cesspools limits development while with sewers there could be substantially increased development. Also, he says the basis for how the county has gotten state and federal funds for the new projects, claiming they’re for “resiliency,” is a “thin argument.” Says Mr. McAllister: “I am for honesty in sewering.”

Another serious issue involving sewering in Suffolk, which is dependent on its underground water table as its sole source of potable water, is it having many of its sewer plants sending tens of millions of gallons a day of wastewater out into bays and the ocean rather than having it fully treated and recharged back into the ground so the underground water table isn’t depleted. 

The largest amount of wastewater is discharged from the Bergen Point Wastewater Treatment plant in West Babylon designed to process 30 million gallons a day sending it out into the Atlantic through an outfall pipe that traverses the Great South Bay.

But plants in Suffolk also doing “outfall” include the Village of Northport Wastewater Treatment Plant which discharges into the Long Island Sound; the Patchogue Sewage Treatment Plant which sends wastewater into the Patchogue River; and the Port Jefferson Sewage Treatment Plant which discharges into the Sound. On the other hand, the new sewer system to serve Westhampton Beach will utilize recharge making use of a sewage treatment plant that services the county’s Francis Gabreski Airport in Westhampton.

Depletion of the underground water table is what has happened in neighboring Nassau County where all its sewer plants do “outfall” and thus lakes and streams in Nassau have dried up or lowered. 

The Mastic-Shirley project is based on recharge. But the Babylon Town project would have wastewater sent to the Southwest Sewer District’s Bergen Point plant and out through its outfall pipe into the Atlantic. Other big sewer projects Mr. Bellone is boosting, in Ronkonkoma and Brentwood, would also send wastewater out of Bergen Point into the Atlantic, impacting on Suffolk’s underground water supply.

Karl Grossman is a veteran investigative reporter and columnist, the winner of numerous awards for his work and a member of the L.I. Journalism Hall of Fame. He is a professor of journalism at SUNY/College at Old Westbury and the author of six books.