After nearly a decade of legal proceedings, Westchester County and Save the Sound have reached a landmark collaborative agreement that strengthens the County’s commitment to protecting water quality and upholding the Clean Water Act.
The settlement was approved by the County Board of Legislators on June 30 and has been submitted to the federal district court and to the U.S. Department of Justice and Environmental Protection Agency for review. The final settlement is expected to become effective later this summer, 45 days after being submitted to the federal agencies.
Under the agreement, the County would:
– take “reasonable measures” to enforce the County Sewer Act within four sanitary sewer districts: New Rochelle, Mamaroneck, Blind Brook, and Port Chester;
– conduct a round of flow monitoring no earlier than 2037 to determine compliancewith t he Flow Limit within the four districts;
– provide materials to support the municipalities’ sewage management efforts;
– spend $475,000 on future environmentally beneficial projects, such as green infrastructure installation, inland wetland remediation, and riparian buffer restorations, with specific projects to be identified by the County and Save the Sound in the coming two years.
“Once finalized and approved by the court, this agreement will complete a series of ongoing repairs and maintenance put in place by agreements with all of the municipalities and the County. Municipalities are responsible for maintaining and repairing their sewer systems but the County is responsible for continuing oversight as it is their plants that are impacted,” said Roger Reynolds, senior legal director for Save the Sound. “When finalized, this agreement and others with municipalities will address the problem of ongoing sewage spills Save the Sound encountered when we opened our Westchester office more than 10 years ago. This will result in a cleaner, healthier Long Island Sound with less sewage pollution, and fewer beach closures and swimming days lost.”
Save the Sound is represented by Super Law Group.
