Seated behind a table at a Harrisburg coffee shop earlier this week, Tom Pelton held up a photo. It showed three small children playing in the waters just off City Island’s shore.
It’s a beach that’s been closed to recreation, and Pelton, a spokesman for the Environmental Integrity Project, pointed out that’s because the water is teeming with bacteria.
It’s bacteria that’s likely the result of raw sewage being discharged into the Susquehanna River from a local sanitary sewer system owned and operated by Capital Region Water, he said.
Today, officials with the Environmental Integrity Project released a report of their investigation into that system, criticizing Capital Region Water’s leaders for not taking the steps needed to eliminate sewer overflows and to ensure clean local waterways.
In some areas, Pelton said, tests have shown E. coli bacteria levels at 10 times higher than what’s considered safe.
That includes City Island’s beach, as well as sewage outfalls linked to the Capitol Complex and the Governor’s Residence. Pelton put that into perspective: Sometimes, when Pennsylvania lawmakers use the bathroom, their waste flows directly into and pollutes the Susquehanna River.
That’s why Environmental Integrity Project officials are calling for the state to foot the bill for system upgrades that would all but eliminate the overflow of raw sewage into local waterways.
It’s a cost that could exceed $1 billion, Capital Region Water officials said.
Those same officials pointed out that their system overflows might not be entirely to blame for the Susquehanna’s bacteria problem.
“Unfortunately, there are many sources of bacterial contamination in a large and complex water body like the Susquehanna River,” Tanya Dierolf, a Capital Region Water spokeswoman, said.
There also is urban, suburban and agricultural runoff and upstream septic systems that impact water quality, she said.
When it rains especially hard, this above-ground sanitary sewer outfall opens along Front Street in Harrisburg, discharging raw waste directly into the Susquehanna River.
Still, the Environmental Integrity Project’s report focuses mainly on Capital Region Water’s sewage discharge — also known as combined sewer overflow.
Much of Harrisburg’s sewer system is combined, meaning both sanitary sewage — the stuff that’s flushed down toilets and washed down sinks and bathtubs — and stormwater pass through the same pipes and treatment facility.
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But the system can handle only so much water and waste, so during periods of heavy rainfall the pipes become filled to capacity. That’s when a process called “combined sewer overflow” kicks in, activating outfalls from which the full pipes can spew sewage-contaminated runoff directly into the Susquehanna River and nearby Paxton Creek.
Nearly 60 outfalls exist along Capital Region Water’s system, and last year sewage was discharged from at least one of those outfalls on 150 individual days.
According to Pelton, those discharges amounted to a total of 1.4 billion gallons of untreated stormwater and sewage flowing into the Susquehanna River from the local system in 2018. That was up from 789 million gallons in 2016.
Officials at Capital Region water have developed a $315 million plan to reduce overflows, runoff and other pollution over the next 20 years. The plan calls for widespread infrastructure upgrades to increase the system’s capacity as well as the installation of greenery-like rain gardens, which are expected to trap runoff before it makes its way to inlets and waterways.
With that plan, stormwater overflows in Harrisburg could be reduced by as much as 60 percent, Capital Region Water officials claim.
That’s not enough, Pelton said. He pointed out that other cities such as Alexandria, Virginia, and Washington D.C., have been able to achieve reductions of more than 90 percent by creating large systems of underground pipes and tanks designed to hold overflow waste and water until it can be treated.
The problem, Dierolf said, is that Harrisburg cannot afford that type of system, which has an estimated cost upward of $1 billion.
“Our rate base cannot afford to eliminate overflow activity within the foreseeable future,” Dierolf said. “We cannot ignore the reality that there are significant poverty and affordability issues in the City of Harrisburg.”
A storm drain in Lemoyne warns against dumping, pointing out that water collected by the drain flows directly to the Susquehanna River.
Officials at the Environmental Integrity Project have dreamed up a solution: The state government should pay. After all, Harrisburg is that state’s capital and state-owned buildings contribute greatly to the pollution and runoff problems, Pelton said.
That’s clear based on water samples taken at overflow outfalls directly linked to the Capitol Complex and the Governor’s Residence, which showed high levels of bacteria, according to the Environmental Integrity Project report.
Because state officials did not receive a copy of the report by Wednesday, they could not comment on the Environmental Integrity Project’s proposal, according to J.J. Abbott, Gov. Tom Wolf’s press secretary.
“The commonwealth understands the importance of finding ways to minimize the effects of stormwater discharge into our waterways,” Abbott said, pointing out that the addition of green space and pervious surfaces has become a priority during new construction and renovations.
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“As we move forward, the commonwealth is committed to identifying areas and ways to reduce the amount of impervious areas we employ in our campus’ architecture,” he said. “We are also considering innovative options such as the use of a special kind of pervious asphalt for paving South Drive as part of the Forum Building renovation.”
Dierolf said Capital Region Water “appreciates any assistance the Commonwealth will provide” and pointed out that officials have taken advantage of PENNVEST grant funding in the past.
The problematic bacteria levels were recorded after environmentalists with the Lower Susquehanna Riverkeeper Association took a total of 60 water samples from the Susquehanna between June 19 and July 31 of this year, according to the report.
“It should be noted that in our bacteria sampling, we did not conduct fecal source tracking or any monitoring upstream of Harrisburg,” the report reads.
No bacteria testing is conducted by Capital Region Water or the City of Harrisburg, according to the report. Dierolf said the Susquehanna River’s water quality is monitored by the state Department of Environmental Protection.
Participants take part in the 22nd annual Penguin Plunge by taking a dip into the Susquehanna River at City Island in Harrisburg, January 1, 2019. The event is a fundraiser for the Humane Society of Harrisburg Area. Dan Gleiter | dgleiter@pennlive.comPENNLIVE.COM
According to the Environmental Integrity Project report, the state DEP has not been hard enough on Capital Region Water and Harrisburg. Pelton said DEP officials should require local bacterial testing in the Susquehanna and other waterways.
Officials with the DEP and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency also should enforce a requirement stipulating that Capital Region Water must regularly publicize information to let community members know when a combined sewer overflow occurs, Pelton said.
Currently, that data is reported only to the state and federal agencies, but community members can find overflow information by calling into Capital Region Water’s combined sewer overflow hotline, Dierolf said.
In the eyes of Environmental Integrity Project officials, Capital Region Water has gotten away with too much, and that’s due entirely to lax enforcement by the DEP and EPA, they said.
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Those officials elaborated in their investigation report, which explains that Capital Region Water officials signed an agreement with DEP and EPA in 2015 that mandates that sewage issues must be remedied.
“However, the agreement was only a partial consent decree — meaning it did not fully solve the problem,” the Environmental Integrity Project report reads. "Since then, DEP and EPA have taken a passive approach with Harrisburg, failing to penalize about 80 percent (105 of 131) of the self-reported discharge violations by Capital Region Water from 2015 through 2018, according to DEP records.”
On Wednesday, DEP officials declined to comment on the criticism. That’s because they had not yet received a full copy of the report, they said.
The short of it is: Capital Region Water officials do not have the resources to immediately address all ongoing problems with their system, Dierolf said.
“To simplify, the primary focus is EPA/DEP’s desire to see more accomplished more quickly, while CRW is working hard to implement a program that existing ratepayers can afford,” she said.
Capital Region Water Board members recently voted to open a public comment period that could eventually lead to the implementation of a new stormwater fee.
The Environmental Integrity Project is a nonprofit based in Washington, D.C. Pelton described the organization as an environmental detective agency that conducts investigations and highlights missteps — all with the goal of encouraging stricter enforcement of environmental laws.
The release of the Environmental Integrity Project’s report on Capital Region Water comes at an inopportune time for the Harrisburg-based water and sewer authority.
In recent weeks, Harrisburg Mayor Eric Papenfuse — who has expressed disgust with the authority’s plan to implement a stormwater fee — introduced his own plan to seek private buyers for the local system.
In a recent text message Papenfuse clarified that “this is not a sale. This is just the city doing its due diligence to see if there is interest and whether there could be savings for ratepayers."
Both Pelton and Ted Evgeniadis, with the Lower Susquehanna Riverkeeper Association, said the report’s release had nothing to do with the proposed sale. In fact, they both said they think privatization is a bad idea.
According to Evgeniadis, it’s about bringing rivers and streams back to health so that people can swim, boat, fish and play safely in local waters.
The Susquehanna River isn’t the only waterway impacted by the pollution, he said. So is its terminus, the Chesapeake Bay. According to the Environmental Integrity Project’s report, Pennsylvania is both the largest source of water and pollution to the bay.
“Some people don’t even know that the Susquehanna River reaches the bay,” Evgeniadis said, referring to local residents. “There is a huge educational aspect of this that I am going to pursue.”
Officials at the Environmental Integrity Project and the Lower Susquehanna Riverkeeper Association have scheduled a news conference about the report for 11 a.m. today along Harrisburg’s riverwalk at the intersection of State and Front streets.