Cambridge City Council Unanimously Calls for Virtual CSO Elimination
Following Boston City Council’s rejection of the Draft CSO Control Plan, this week Cambridge City Council unanimously passed a Policy Order calling for Virtual Combined Sewer Overflow Elimination in the CSO Control Plan, and for broader state and federal funding and across the entire MWRA district.
What is Virtual CSO Elimination?
Virtual CSO Elimination is what MWRA provided the beaches in South Boston, decades ago. During those projects, Virtual CSO Elimination is what EPA considered to be no CSO sewage discharges except during a storm expected only about once every 25 years under 2050 climate conditions. Engineers call this a 25-year level of control.
A Collaborative Effort
This Policy Order came from the Cambridge City Council, City Staff, advocates (Save the Alewife Brook and Mystic River Watershed Association), and very importantly, the North Sherman Street Neighbors. Sherman Street neighbors spoke out for an end to CSOs through the climate-resilient strategy of sewer separation paired with Green Stormwater Infrastructure.
We are especially grateful to the Cambridge City Councilor Patty Nolan and her Aide Patrick Hayes, Vice Mayor Azeem, Councillor Sobrinho-Wheeler, Mayor Siddiqui, and Councillor Al-Zubi.
Health Impacts to Environmental Justice Populations
The Policy Order was passed unanimously and with an amendment from Councillor Al-Zubi. This amendment is one key reason why we fight so hard to end CSOs at Alewife Brook:
WHEREAS: Combined Sewer Overflows discharge untreated or partially treated sewage, bacteria, pathogens, nutrients, and other pollutants into the Charles River, Alewife Brook, and connected waterways during wet-weather events, creating risks to public health, in particular to Environmental Justice populations; and
The Work Ahead
The City's current plan puts a smelly, hazardous sewage tank in the Sherman Street neighborhood, with no sewer separation for that outfall. The worst CSO outfall in Greater Boston would discharge more raw sewage during the larger storms that flood Alewife Brook.
The Sherman Street tank only makes sense if paired with a real plan to complete sewer separation and convert it to a stormwater tank. The Climate Resilient solution is not sewage storage. At Alewife Brook, the solution that scales with Climate Change is sewer separation, paired with stormwater wetlands.
A Regional Problem Needs Regional Funding
MWRA prefers to send sewage into our rivers, using the Mystic and Charles Rivers and Alewife Brook as overflow sewers because it is cheaper than sending that sewage to the Deer Island Wastewater Treatment Plant. MWRA’s strategy is to use the threat of municipal infrastructure costs against the cities of Cambridge and Somerville to create a political situation where the MWRA can shirk making needed investments.
Every MWRA community sends its sewage to Deer Island. In some storms, MWRA’s regional system reaches capacity, meaning it fills up downstream, making it impossible to pump sewage out of the Alewife area.
MWRA was created by the Legislature with a funding mechanism to clean up CSOs, and it has the bonding capacity and the budget for the debt service to pay for Virtual CSO Elimination. Watch MWRA's Executive Director explain the cost of a 25-year level of control: https://youtu.be/9UPFGAY-arU?is=-aRYudDU2jklG3NH
Ending the CSOs is the final piece of the Boston Harbor clean-up - the piece that MWRA has not completed. Through MWRA sewer rates, we all paid our share to end sewage dumping in Boston Harbor and to virtually end sewage dumping at the South Boston beaches. Now it is time to finish the task by ending CSOs dumping sewage into Alewife Brook and the Mystic and Charles Rivers.
Cambridge and Somerville should not be double-charged. MWRA must be held accountable, to use its funding to end sewage pollution in our rivers.