State Sen. Brendan P. Crighton and state Rep. Lori A. Ehrlich proved they understand their Lynn and Swampscott constituents’ need by ensuring $5.3 million in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) money will help pay for work to start eliminating sewage and stormwater discharges onto King’s Beach.
“It is a good start,” said Ehrlich.
Ehrlich’s successful campaigns against environmental threats predated her 2008 election to the Massachusetts House of Representatives. She exposed health dangers posed by the former Salem power plant. As a legislator, Ehrlich raised concerns about lax natural gas utility oversight efforts years before the 2018 Merrimack Valley gas explosions.
In pushing with Crighton and fellow House members to get King’s Beach cleaned up, Ehrlich noted that public officials and community groups are fed up with the annual litany of soaring bacteria counts, followed by beach-closing orders, on King’s Beach.
“People go to the beach to make memories, not to get sick,” she said.
Eliminating wastewater outflows onto a popular beach, bordering residential neighborhoods with easy access from Lynn Shore Drive and Humphrey Street should be top priority for public officials.
But lack of accountability and action from public agencies has allowed the contamination to continue.
In October, Lynn Water & Sewer Commission officials said Lynn sewage does not flow onto the beach. The Town of Swampscott has started replacing aging and crumbling pipes in its sewerage system and, in September, Town Administrator Sean Fitzgerald estimated that another $20 million will be needed to be spent fixing the system.
Part of the work involved in ending King’s Beach contamination involves finding the wastewater’s source. A pipe network stretching across 950 acres in Lynn and Swampscott feeds into the pipes leading to the beach.
Some of the ARPA money will be spent on determining the contaminant sources. Water & Sewer has contracted with an engineering firm to conduct “illicit-discharge detection.”
Ultimately, a modernized Swampscott sewerage system along with new pump stations and improvements on the Lynn side of the pipe network will render King’s Beach a clean and pleasant place to enjoy the ocean.
Lynn and Swampscott residents and everyone who enjoys King’s Beach are fortunate to have Ehrlich and Crighton honoring their commitment to the public good by working to ensure an environmental and health threat is vanquished.
