Bacteria levels that exceed health standards continued to impact many sites on the East End in 2024, according to the Eastern Long Island Blue Water Task Force, the Surfrider Foundation’s volunteer-led water quality monitoring program. And now the public can access the data collection by way of new signs at beaches that link via QR code to the task force website.
While ocean and bay beaches generally test clean, five of 26 samples collected at the third jetty at the Georgica Beach Association in East Hampton Village showed bacteria levels that exceeded the recreational health standard in 2024, and four of 27 samples collected at Sagg Main Beach failed to meet health standards.
These are among the findings of the Blue Water Task Force, a year-round sampling effort by Surfrider’s Eastern Long Island Chapter with Concerned Citizens of Montauk and Peconic Baykeeper, which last year sampled 83 sites from Montauk to Quogue and on the North Fork and Shelter Island. Samples are taken weekly during the summer, biweekly in the fall and spring, and monthly during the winter, and analyzed at Surfrider’s labs at the C.C.O.M. and Peconic Baykeeper offices.
“We test for enterococcus bacteria, which is found in the digestive systems of warm-blooded animals,” Jaime LeDuc, Surfrider’s Blue Water Task Force manager, said on June 11 on the beach near the Mecox Bay cut. There, officials from the three organizations, along with Chip Maran of the Southampton Town Trustees, convened to announce the task force’s water quality report for 2024 and the new signs, which offer a way to convey data on bacteria levels at the sampling sites and help the public make informed decisions about bathing at a particular beach.
“Our goal is to raise awareness about these pollution problems and give people the information they need,” Ms. LeDuc said.
Water quality results are compared to the health standard used by New York State and Suffolk County, specifically 104 colony-forming units of enterococcus per 100 milliliters.
The Suffolk Health Department “is going to be fielding phone calls for the Surfrider signs in order to answer any questions that people have about swimming in the water,” Mr. Maran said. “Now we have a sign here, we have a sign at Scott Cameron [in Bridgehampton], we have a sign at Sagg Main, and we have a sign at the Sagg Bridge. Everybody can go to the QR code and access the information for the inner bay and the ocean side of both locations.”
Of the summertime weekly samples, Peter Topping, the Peconic Baykeeper, said, “We have the results available 24 hours later. Those results are all public, so there’s no guessing. You don’t have to make a phone call, you can just go on the website.”
“Our organizations work really hard to supplement the beach monitoring program that Suffolk County is doing,” Ms. LeDuc said. “So we test areas that they can’t get to. A perfect example is Mecox Bay.”
Elevated levels of enterococcus increase the likelihood that other pathogens are present in the water. High bacteria rates can be attributed to stormwater runoff, which carries pollutants into water bodies, and heavy rain, which can lead to flooding and cause groundwater levels to rise. This, the water quality report states, “is particularly problematic on the East End, where most residences and businesses are serviced by cesspools and septic systems.”
Fifty-four percent of samples taken at Sagg Pond in 2024 exceeded health standards for bacterial counts, and nitrogen pollution has led to blooms of cyanobacteria, or toxic blue-green algae. At Windmill Beach in Sag Harbor Village, the rate was 43 percent. It “is not a good place to let children wash their hands or splash around,” according to the report. A QR-coded sign is now at the beach, installed by the village’s harbor committee.
At South Lake in Montauk, once a lifeguarded beach popular among families with small children, 24 percent of the samples exceeded health standards for bacterial counts. Town-led efforts are underway to reduce stormwater runoff and contaminants entering Lake Montauk, with the goal of reopening it to the public for swimming.
The site experienced the highest bacterial levels of Montauk’s 30 sample sites in 2024, Rebecca Holloway of C.C.O.M. said. “That is a site that doesn’t have any signage, as of now, of the bacterial contamination.” Most years, “there have been through-the-roof levels of fecal contamination in the lake at that location. . . . We would love to take this new signage as a model for this site as well, in the future, in addition to other efforts that we’re making with the town.”
