State and Local Beach Health Innovations and Success Stories
Summer 2006
EPA-823-N-06-001
Beach Currents is designed to promote communication among state, tribal, and local public health officials
about beach protection activities. This third edition features Connecticut's and Washington's beach programs.
We encourage all beach management professionals to submit articles sharing their successes and challenges.
To submit an article or to get more information about the EPA Beaches Program, call 202-566-0444 or send an
e-mail to ost-beaches@epa.gov.
Connecticut Implements
the Beach Grant
When the BEACH Act Grant arrived at the
Connecticut Department of Public Health (CT
DPH), we rediscovered the old truth that the
best way to escape a problem is to knuckle
down and solve it. Before we could power
up the GPS units, we had to answer the one
question that is still kicking sand in everyone's
face, "What's a beach?" The answer was right
at hand: identify where most people swim in
Long Island Sound. We track 63 marine public
bathing areas that are regulated and monitored
by 21 local health departments along our shore-
line, as well as four state park marine beaches
overseen by the Connecticut Department of
Environmental Protection (CT DEP). Each
of these beaches (comprising 144 sampling
stations) is regulated under a published set of
guidelines that spell out how they should be
monitored and when they should be closed.
Because the grant draws a sharp distinction
between supposing and knowing, we knew
In this issue...
Ocean Beach Park, New London, Connecticut.
that we couldn't wait for success to catch up
with us while we plunged ahead in the early
months—and it did require months to figure
out our larger game plan. To get started, we
needed to touch base with the local recreation
and health departments along the shoreline,
because they knew where the beach end points
were. Soon we had our baseline location data
for the beaches and sampling stations. But that
was just the beginning.
continued on page 2
Connecticut Implements the Beach Grant 1
Region 10 Dive Team 2
Rapidly Measured Indicators of Recreational Water Quality Are
Predictive of Swimming-Associated Gastrointestinal Illness . . 3
Floating on a Wave 4
Calendar of Events 7
News from EPA Regions and HQ's Beach Program 8
Surf Zone 9
For Your Beach Bag 11
Announcements. . . 12
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Connecticut Implements the Beach Grant (continued from page 1)
Niantic boardwalk.
We work with 24 municipalities, another
state agency, and our state laboratory to
implement the grant. Our meetings for shore-
line public health officials are an integral
part of the overall program as we gather ev-
eryone under one roof twice a year to answer
questions and explain the grant as it evolves.
These meetings are tied directly to a steady
improvement in data quality over the past 3
years. For instance, we review the mechanics
and intent of our annual EPA Beach Survey,
which collects notification data. We also
cover the role of our state laboratory and its
essential courier service that handles marine
water sample collection and testing.
Our laboratory sends us monitoring data
as text files directly from its Laboratory
Information Management (LIM) system. We
use software embedded in a custom database
application developed in-house to extract the
monitoring results of interest to EPA for the
grant. Shortly after we process the monitor-
ing data for local storage, we start receiving
the completed EPA Beach Surveys from the
local health departments and CT DEP We
store this notification data with the monitor-
ing data. We use our own software for its
flexibility and because it allows us to quickly
build datasets in response to occasional
requests for beach data from other state agen-
cies, nongovernmental organizations, and
individuals. We can also use GIS to display
monitoring and notification data graphically.
The final steps for our data in their journey
from Connecticut to EPA have been the most
challenging. This is where we waited the
longest for success to catch up with us. Here
I am referring to forwarding the notification
and monitoring data to EPA's two archive
databases, PRAWN and STORET. It takes
a unique blend of patience, work, and skill
sets to play this last inning of the data game.
When we did finally succeed, I was reminded
of something Mark Twain wrote, "Apparently
there is nothing that cannot happen."
Jon Dinneen, Connecticut Department of
Public Health
Region 10 Dive Team
EPA's Region 10 Dive Team provides scien-
tific, polluted-water diving services to the
Region through inspections, sampling, sur-
veys, contract oversight, and long-term moni-
toring. More than 30 years ago at the Federal
Water Pollution Control Administration,
several divers developed a team to support
their agency's need for scientific diving
expertise in contaminated water. Now EPA
has a dive team supporting Superfund work,
Clean Water Act work, and other related EPA
offices, agencies, and governments.
The dive team works on a variety of projects,
including surveys of contaminated sediment
capping, criminal investigations of illegal
dumping or discharge sites, outfall surveys,
and biological surveys. EPA's Region 7 called
on the Region 10 Dive Team to help recover
parts of the Columbia Space Shuttle, which
continued on page 3
Beach Currents Summer 2006
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Region 10 Dive Team (continuedfrom page 2)
disintegrated upon re-entry in February
2003. The divers searched the bottom of the
Toledo-Bend Reservoir near Jasper, Texas, in
low- or zero-visibility conditions by sweep-
ing the bottom with their legs and arms to
locate suspicious objects. The reservoir hides
a submerged forest, so divers had to be care-
ful of the threat of entanglement with trees,
horizontal logs, and stumps.
Divers are increasingly aware of problems
of diving in contaminated water, and most
commercial diving companies now recog-
nize the need to protect their divers. There
have been links of diver exposure to illness.
Stories have even been reported of divers
getting cancer (San Diego Harbor Patrol,
Michigan Police, Israeli Navy). The waters
contain things like Pfiesteria, swimmer's
itch, Acanthamoeba Keratitis, Trbutyltins,
PCBs, and drug wastes. In addition, pollution
is usually more concentrated in areas where
EPA divers go because of outfalls, unregu-
lated discharges, and direct discharges from
ships, docks, and industrial facilities. Because
of these health risks, the Region 10 Dive
Team has developed several important stan-
dard operating procedures (SOPs) to protect
its divers.
Decon of diver; atMcCormick and Baxter—part of Portland Harbor SF clean-up
project, Oregon.
One of the key SOPs is for decontamination
(called decon). The Region 10 dive team has
different SOPs for decon after exposure to
biological hazards versus chemical exposure.
Some elements of these SOPs include always
rinsing with clean freshwater before remov-
ing gear, disposing of drygloves after each
dive, establishing hot and clean zones on the
dive platform, washing clothes separately
that have been on the dive platform, and
not taking work-related, dive gear home. For
more information on EPA's diving SOPs and
the Region 10 Dive Team, see yosem/fe.epcr.
gov/R 10/OEA. NSF/webpage/Dive+Team.
Rapidly Measured Indicators of Recreational Water
Quality Are Predictive of Swimming-Associated
Gastrointestinal Illness
The BEACH Act requires EPA to conduct re-
search to provide the support of new criteria
for recreational waters. Standard methods
that measure recreational water quality
require at least 24 hours before results are
available, making it impossible to assess
the quality of water within a single day.
Timothy Wade, Rebecca Calderon, Elizabeth
Sams, and Ann Williams of the National
Health and Environmental Effects Research
Laboratory, Human Studies Division, EPA;
Michael Beach of Parasitic Diseases, Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention; and
Kristen Brenner and Alfred Dufour of the
National Exposure Research Laboratory,
EPA have been developing rapid methods to
measure microorganisms. Santo Domingo
et al. in 2003 developed a modified version
of polymerase chain reaction (PCR), called
Quantitative TaqMan PCR (QPCR-Applied
Biosystems, Foster City, CA), to quantify
indicator bacteria in recreational waters in 2
hours or less. Because these methods provide
a faster assessment of water quality, they
have the potential to significantly reduce ill-
continued on page 4
Beach Currents Summer 2006
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Rapidly Measured Indicators ...(continued from page 3)
nesses resulting from exposure to recreational
waters and to reduce errors in beach closings
or public notifications.
By using these rapid methods, officials could
give considerably more accurate and timely
assessments of recreational water quality. The
authors conducted a prospective cohort study
of beachgoers at two beaches in the Great
Lakes region. One beach was in the Indiana
Dunes National Lakeshore, in Indiana on Lake
Michigan, and the second was near Cleveland,
Ohio, on Lake Erie. The study consisted of a
health survey of beachgoers and water-quality
evaluation. The beaches were selected specifi-
cally because they were affected by discharges
from waste treatment plants. The purpose
of the study was to examine the association
between recreational water quality, obtained
using rapid methods, and gastrointestinal
(GI) illness after swimming. Beachgoers were
asked about swimming and other beach activi-
ties and 10-12 days later were asked about
the occurrence of GI symptoms. GI illness
was defined as any of the following: diarrhea
(three or more loose stools in a 24-hr, period),
vomiting, nausea and stomachache, and nau-
sea or stomachache that affect regular activity
(inability to perform regular daily activities).
The authors tested water samples for
Enterococcus and Bacteroides species using
the PCR method. They observed significant
trends between increased GI illness and
Enterococcus at the Lake Michigan beach
and a positive trend for Enterococcus at the
Lake Erie beach. The association remained
significant for Enterococcus when the two
beaches were combined. They observed a
positive trend for Bacteroides at the Lake
Erie beach, but no trend was observed at the
Lake Michigan beach. Enterococcus samples
collected at 8:00 a.m. were predictive of GI
illness that day. The association between
Enterococcus and illness strengthened as time
spent swimming in the water increased. This
is the first study to show that water qual-
ity measured by rapid methods can predict
swimming-associated health effects. The full
article can be found in Environmental Health
Perspective 114:24-28 (2006). DOI:10.1289/
ehp.8273 available via hffp://dx.do/.org/.
Floating on a Wave
The noise of the ocean becomes muffled as
I pull the hood of my wetsuit over my head.
Picking up my board, I run for the surf. "It's
now or never," I tell myself as I try to pick the
perfect moment to paddle out. Stroking hard,
I dive under the crest of the first breaking
wave. "It's got more power than it looks," my
buddy shouts from the line up. As if I need a
reminder. Stroking harder, I barley make it
over the second and third waves. I'm out. I'm
scared.
Just a few hundred yards from the chaotic mess
of the North Pacific, the Cove, as most call it, is
a slightly protected beach that sits just inside
the mouth of Grey's Harbor, Washington. It's
an interesting wave—commonly referred to as
a shore-break—where it crashes abruptly on the
shore. When it's big, it's hollow, cold and has
no mercy.
"See, the paddle's not that bad," my buddy
shouts at me trying to ease my nerves. "It's
never that bad!" I shout back, reminding him,
continued on page 5
Beach Currents Summer 2006
-------
and myself, what this place is capable of.
The Cove and I have an interesting relation-
ship. This is the place I broke my first board,
and this is the place that is responsible for
the scar on my left cheek. The sound of a
thunderous breaking wave in the background
sends a slight chill creeping across my back.
There's a lot that surfers at the Cove have to
worry about. With more and more people
from Seattle making the 2.5-hour drive, this
place can get crowded. Inexperienced surfers
often paddle out without knowing how dan-
gerous it is and make it even more danger-
ous for others. Localism here is some of the
fiercest on the west coast. It's not uncommon
to get intentionally "stuffed" on a big wave by
an angry local. If that isn't enough to worry
about, the Cove is also home to Westport's
wastewater treatment plant outfall. The plant
is an old one that has had trouble in the
past. It has already undergone upgrades and
is scheduled for more soon. Knowing that
improvements at the plant have already oc-
curred helps me feel better.
"Outside!" someone suddenly yells as every-
one starts paddling out to sea with hopes
of not being crushed under the massive ap-
proaching waves. With the waves stacked on
the horizon like enormous freight trains, my
stomach bottoms out. Paddling as hard as I
can, my heart is beating in my throat. Going
up the first wave, I'm safe; it's now the second
one I'm worried about. Looking behind me,
the first wave breaks, takes out half the surf-
ers in the water, and lets out a deep thunder
Floating on a Wave (continued from page 4)
that even people on the beach can feel. The
second wave approaches. There's a moment
of silence as we all watch the second wave
grow. It keeps growing as it gets closer.
Feeling like I just scored the winning goal at
a World Cup game, I am congratulated on my
accomplishment. The wave of the day and all
my other worries are temporarily nonexistent.
"Its all yours!" my buddy yells as he and ev-
eryone else realizes that I'm the only one out
there in perfect position to catch it. "YEAH!
GO! GO!" everyone else starts yelling at me.
In moments like these, you don't have a lot of
time to think. I spin my board toward shore,
take a deep breath and start paddling. The
wave lifts me skyward; I close my eyes, push
away from my board, and attempt to stand on
my feet. I'm momentarily airborne, and my
feet somehow manage to place themselves
perfectly under the board. I'm up!
The bottom of the wave looks so far away. I
feel the mountain of water begin the chase.
Pushing hard with both legs at the trough of
the wave, I duck my head to miss the curtain
of the toppling mountain. Silence. Tunnel vi-
sion sets in. "It's all over," I think to myself. A
hallway of flowing water now surrounds me.
continued on page 6
Beach Currents Summer 2006
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Floating on a Wave (continued from page 5)
The light begins to grow, getting brighter and
brighter. Gaining speed and with water going
everywhere, the wave shoots me out from its
belly. I launch my board into the air behind
the back of the closing wave and give out a
shout of pure joy. Hoots and hollers come
from a few fellow surfers who saw what I had
just done.
Feeling like I just scored the winning goal at
a World Cup game, I am congratulated on my
accomplishment. The wave of the day and all
my other worries disappear. It was a 5-second
ride at most, and suddenly the 5 hours in the
car, dodging beginners, avoiding the locals,
and fears of the pollution become worth
every second. At moments like these, I am
reminded of why I do what I do. Floating on a
cloud is often the metaphor used to describe
pure happiness.
I say floating on a wave is better.
Ryan McEliece, Department ofHealth and
Ecology, Washington state.
The Cove is known for its easy drive-up access and free parking, making it a popular beach year-round. Surfers
especially love the beach for its fast and powerful waves. In the summer months, 200 to 500 visitors arrive each
week. Winter months might see as many as 200 surfers in the water on a week with good waves, plus many more
visitors on the beach.
In 2005, the BEACH Program sampled this beach from mid-May to mid-September and again November to
December. Surfers visit the BEACH Program Web site (www.doh.wa.gov/beach) to make sure the beach is open be-
fore driving the 2.5 hours from Seattle. Their slogan is, "Surf before you surf!" The Washington State Department of
Health and Ecology runs this collaborative effort. Its BEACH Program pulls together county, tribal governments and
dedicated volunteers to actively monitor water quality of beaches throughout the state.
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Beach Currents Summer 2006
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Calendar of Events
October 11-13, 2006
National Beaches Conference
Niagara Falls, NY
The National Beaches Conference is being co-
sponsored by EPA and the Great Lakes Beach
Association (GLBA). For additional information, visit
the conference Web site at www.fefrofech-ffx.com/
beach conf2006.
October 21-26, 2006
Water Environment Federation's Technical
Exhibition and Conference (WEFTEC) 2006
Dallas, TX
WEFTEC 2006 will bring together thousands of
water quality professionals from around the globe to
build relationships, exchange ideas, and swap
everyday solutions with professionals who share in
their commitment for safe water. Typically, there are
80-100 sessions and 15-25 workshops in addition to
the exhibition. The conference will address timely
issues in water and wastewater, including collection
systems, membrane technology, plant operation and
treatment, regulations, research, residuals and
biosolids, utility management, water reuse and
recycling, and water quality and watershed
management. For additional information, visit the
conference Web site atwww.weffec.com.
November 3-9, 2006
SETAC 2006 North America 27th Annual Meeting
Montreal, Canada
The Society of Environmental Toxicology and
Chemistry (SETAC) is a nonprofit, worldwide
professional society composed of individuals and
institutions engaged in the study, analysis, and
solution of environmental problems, the management
and regulation of natural resources, environmental
education, and research and development. This year's
meeting theme is global environment and sustainabil-
ity: sound science in a world of diversity. The meeting
will be held at the Palais de Congres. For additional
information, visit the conference Web site at
http://www.setac.org/montreal.
November 6-9, 2006
American Water Resources Association 2006
Annual Conference
Baltimore, MD
The conference presents a unique opportunity for
water resource practitioners from diverse disciplines
to gather and interact together. In addition to
offering a broad range of technical, social and legal
topics, a number of sessions will focus on topics of
current interest, including infrastructure asset
management, water (Homeland) security, watershed
management, dam rehabilitation or removal,
sustainability of drinking water supplies, impacts/
solutions of urbanization on water resources,
drought and flood management, and ecological
restoration of wetlands and stream corridors. This
conference will feature cutting edge water resource
related research and project case studies from all
over the country and the world, offering interesting
and profitable learning opportunities to all
attendees. For additional information, visit the
conference Web site at www.awra.org/meetings/
Baltimore2006.
November 21-22, 2006
4th Joint Agencies Bathing Waters Conference
Newcastle, County Down, Northern Ireland
The theme of this UK symposium will be the
challenges of introducing the new Bathing Waters
Directive (now approved by both the European
Commission and the European Parliament) and the
measures needed to ensure that overall compliance
does not fall despite the more stringent standards. The
conference will be a joint event among the
Environment Agency, the Environment and Heritage
Service (Northern Ireland) and the Scottish
Environment Protection Agency with support from
DEFRA, the Scottish Executive and Environmental
Policy Group (DOE NI). The symposium will be held at
the Slieve Donard Resort & Spa
(www.hosf/ngshofe/s.com). For more information,
contactlynn.mcfarland@doeni.gov.uk,
ruth.stidson@sepa.org.uk, roslyn.stewart@doeni.gov.uk,
orandrew.wither@environment-agency.gov.uk.
Beach Currents Summer 2006
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News from EPA Regions and
HQ's Beach Program
2006 Beach Grants Announcements
EPA made almost $10 million in grants available
in spring 2006 to eligible states to protect public
health at the nation's beaches. These grants are to
help coastal and Great Lakes states to implement
programs for monitoring water quality at the
beach and notifying the public when water quality
problems exist. For more information, visit
www.epa.gov/wafersc/ence/beaches/granfs/
fy06fs.hfm.
Public Health Risks: Coastal
Observations for Decision Making
This workshop was held in St. Petersburg, Florida
on January 23-25, 2006. It was sponsored by
NOAA, EPA, USGS, CDC, NASA, the National
Science Foundation-Geosciences Directorate,
and the Alliance for Coastal Technologies. The
workshop was designed to bring together manag-
ers, coastal public health officials, and scientists
to identify observations and environmental
information needed for ecosystem-based decision
making for public health issues related to coastal
waters. The meeting had a strong focus on beach
public health issues and included discussions on
shellfish and harmful algal blooms. One key goal
of this workshop was to develop a blueprint for
building an integrated global ocean observation
and disease surveillance system that can deliver
useful and timely information about ocean and
coastal public health risks to managers and deci-
sion makers. A report from this meeting is being
produced for beach and coastal public health
managers and for use in the planning process of
the Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS).
BEACON
EPA developed BEACON, or BEach Advisory and
Closing Online Notification system, to make state
beach advisory and closing data available to the
public. The Beaches Environmental Assessment
and Coastal Health (BEACH) Act (section 406(e))
requires EPA to create a national coastal recre-
ation water pollution occurrence database, which
contains state reported beach monitoring and
notification data, and allow the public to access it
by electronic means.
In BEACON, each beach is displayed on a map
that links the beach to data. Users select a beach
and view the available data for that beach by
either choosing a state and county or typing the
beach name. See http://oaspub.epa.gov/
beacon/beacon_national_page.main.
BEACON pulls data from 2 EPA databases-
PRAWN and RAD. PRAWN is the PRogram track-
ing, beach Advisories, Water quality standards,
and Nutrients database. PRAWN stores beach ad-
visory and closing data. RAD is the Reach Address
Database. The beach location data is stored in RAD
and displayed in BEACON as a map.
Beach Currents Summer 2006
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Resources for Local Beach Health Information
The following resources are just a few that report local beach water quality conditions.
Several resources will lye highlighted in each issue.
,
EPA New England Beach Initiative
The goal of EPA's Beach Initiative is to protect
public health by reducing beach closures in
New England. To meet this goal, the number
of beach closures must be reduced, using a
monitoring, assessment and public notifica-
tion program consistent with EPA's tiered
monitoring guidance. EPA will work closely
with state environmental and public health
agencies to develop and implement the new
beach initiative. EPA will focus its efforts on
providing technical assistance to state and
local environmental and public health agen-
cies for assessment and monitoring
as needed and as funds allow, and will back
up its assistance efforts with regulatory and
enforcement tools where appropriate. For
more information and for links to state moni-
toring Web sites in New England, visit
www.epo.gov/ne/eco/beoches/index.hfm/.
Beach Currents Summer 2006
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10
Evaluation of New, Rapid
Microbiological Measurement
Methods for Recreational
Water Quality
EPA-approved methods for quantifying bac-
teria concentration require an 18- to 96-hour
incubation period. This time lag can result in
contaminated beaches being open during the
incubation period and becoming clean before
public health warnings can be issued. To ad-
dress this problem, the state of California re-
quested that the Southern California Coastal
Water Research Project (SCCWRP) facilitate
development of tests that measure bacteria
levels rapidly enough to make possible same-
day health risk warnings. Following proof of
concept and development phases, SCCWRP
has conducted evaluative testing of several
new rapid methods.
Two levels of testing have been conducted,
evaluating six types of technologies being
developed by nine different research teams.
The first of these tests was conducted in June
2004 with encouraging results. A second eval-
uation test was conducted in June 2005. The
results from the second test were even more
encouraging, with two methods (Quantitative
Polymerase Chain Reaction and Transcription
Mediated Amplification) proving to be more
than 80 percent accurate with respect to the
state's standard for Enterococci.
Copies of these reports are available at:
www.sccwrp.org
Co-Regulator Pathogens
Workshop: Bacteria Criteria for
Inland Waters
Three workshops were held in 2005 and
2006 for EPA and its co-regulators (states and
tribes). The objective of these meetings was
threefold: (1) to provide a clear understanding
of EPA's progress and challenges related to
issuing new bacteria criteria; (2) to articulate
and prioritize implementation challenges
associated with the 1986 criteria; and (3) to
develop options for moving forward with
adoption and implementation of the 1986
criteria. Participants also discussed how to
use and interpret the 1986 bacteria criteria for
inland waters in light of the most recent EPA
policy as articulated at 40 CFR Part 131 titled
Water Quality Standards for Coastal and
Great Lakes Recreation Waters; Final Rule,
promulgated in the Federal Register (69 FR
67218, November 16, 2004).
The audience included representatives from
state, tribal and EPA regional water quality
standards programs, permits programs, as-
sessment programs, TMDL programs, as well
as others. If you have any questions about
these workshops, contact Shari Barash at 202-
566-0996, or by e-mail at barash.shari@epa.gov.
EPA Launches New Beaches Web
Site for Kids
In June 2006 EPA launched a beach Web site
for children. The site, for kids through sixth
grade, contains information about the causes
and effects of pollution at beaches and things
kids can do to protect themselves and their
beach. It teaches them about what to look
for to find out if conditions are not good for
water contact and what to ask of local beach
managers. The Beach Kids Web site educates
and entertains. Kids will find games, puzzles,
and interactive stories that both challenge
and amuse as they teach. The site is at
www.epa.gov/beachk/ds.
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Tidy Turtle helps kids learn about beaches.
Beach Currents Summer 2006
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11
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New Publications and Resources
Association of Metropolitan Sewerage Agencies' January 2005 Action Plan (in response to the Report to
Congress).
Beach Advisories, Posting and Closures SOLEC indicator I 4200 in State of the Great Lakes 2005.
Kinzelman, J. and J. Hiller. 2005. Incorporating Education and Outreach in the Re-Engineering of a
Storm Water Outfall Impacting Recreational Water Quality at Two Public Bathing Beaches on Lake
Michigan. Current: The Journal of Marine Education. Submitted for publication.
Kleinheinz, G. and E. Englebert. 2005. Cladophora and the beach: Implications for Public Health.
In-press: Technical Report, UW-Milwaukee WATER Institute.
Olyphant, Greg A. 2005. Statistical basis for predicting the need for bacterially induced beach closures:
Emergence of a paradigm? Water Research 39 (20): 4953-4960.
Sampson, R., S. Swiatnicki, C. McDermott and G. Kleinheinz. 2005. E.coli at Lake Superior.
Recreational Beaches. Journal of Great Lakes Research. In-press.
Scott, T. M., T.M. Jenkins, J. Lukasik and J.B. Rose. 2005. Potential Use of a Host Associated Molecular
Marker in Enterocoecus faecium as an Index of Human Fecal Pollution; Environmental Science &
Technology. 39 (1): 283-287.
Beach Currents Summer 2006
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Announcements
ERA'S 2006 National Beach Conference, October 77-73, 2006
This 3-day conference is sponsored by EPA in collaboration with the Great Lakes Beach Association. It will
provide a national framework for discussion of beach water quality issues, exchange of information, and
coordination of efforts in research and decision making. The conference format will consist of presenta-
tions and panel discussions. Posters will also be presented. This conference will be similar to the 2004
National Beach Conference that was held in San Diego, California.
The expected audience includes beach water quality managers, public health and environmental groups,
researchers, and the public. EPA invites participants from federal, state, and local governments, public
health, environmental, and nongovernmental organizations, Indian Tribes, academia, and concerned
citizens. For more information or to register, visit the conference Web site www.tetratech-ffx.com/
beach conf2006/.
The material in this document has been subjected to Agency technical and policy review and approved for publication as an EPA report. The
views expressed by individual authors, however, are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
Beach Currents Summer 2006
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