Skoufis puts pressure on governor to sign water contaminants bill

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Riverkeeper's Dan Shapley supports the legislation

NEWBURGH – Senator James Skoufis (D, Cornwall) met with local officials, environmental advocates and members of community organizations, Thursday, to put pressure on Governor Cuomo to sign into law the new Emerging Contaminants Bill (S1759A) which provides universal water testing in New York State.

Currently, the state only requires annual water testing from communities that have a population of 10,000, or larger. An estimated 2.5 million New Yorkers live in areas with a lower population and as a consequence are not required to have their water tested. The legislation will require that all New York State water providers be tested for the 13 emerging contaminants already required of larger community water sources, as well as test for an additional 27 emerging contaminants listed by the federal EPA.

The list of contaminants includes perfluorinated compounds (PFAS, PFOS, PFOA) which were the cause of Newburgh’s water contamination crisis.

Skoufis said Newburgh was the “canary in the coalmine” for the rest of the state regarding the importance of rigorous water testing and that testing is the first and best step toward mitigation.

“It’s in some ways similar to the start of the pandemic where it was all about testing, testing, testing to identify where there was infection,” said Skoufis. “Similarly, we need to identify where there is contamination because that’s the only way we can then respond to that contamination in the first place. In Newburgh, the residents here were drinking contaminated water for a very long time. We want to make sure that other communities don’t go through the same,” he said.

Co-Director of Riverkeeper Dan Shapley agreed with Skoufis and said no other measures can be taken without testing first and testing is an important public health measure.

“It really brings an important level of protection to all communities in New York State because the first step is to test,” said Shapley. “If the test shows a problem, then we start looking at solutions: finding alternate water supplies, stopping the source of pollution if it can be found and that’s essential for public health because what we drink everyday affects our health,” he said.

Shapley added that emerging contaminants in water have been connected to kidney disease, types of cancer, thyroid issues, sexual health issues, reproductive issues and developmental disabilities among others. Also, that similar legislation has been around since 2017, but had not been signed into law by Governor Cuomo, which is why it is imperative that he sign this legislation into law now.

The bill has passed both houses with bi-partisan support. The only remaining procedure is approval by the Governor.




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