an area lying 10 to 100 km (6 to 62 mi) off the coast between Sandy Hook and Cape 

 May. Mortalities were greatest among surf clams, ocean quahogs, and other benthic 

 animals. Lobster catches declined almost 50 percent during the period. These events 

 have been described in detail by Swanson and Sindermann ( 1979). As a result of this 

 crisis, in November 1976, the federal government declared the New Jersey coast a re- 

 source disaster area. Estimates of losses to the commercial and recreational fishing 

 industries and related processing and service businesses were as high as $550 million. 

 Local fishermen were also concerned about the long-term impact of this event on 

 their fisheries. Despite the fact that the sewage sludge dumping was known to con- 

 tribute only a small proportion of the oxygen demand within the New York Bight 

 apex (Segar and Berberian, 1976), once again sewage sludge dumping became the 

 object of suspicion among the public. 



Here then in 1976 in the floatables incident and the oxygen depletion event were 

 two environmental disasters of just the nature that had been predicted in the early 

 1970s. What could be more natural than for the public to conclude that the earlier 

 investigators had been correct and that the sewage sludge dumping was indeed 

 responsible for these two environmental events? Public pressure for government ac- 

 tion to prevent the happenings of 1 976 from recurring was extremely strong. The real 

 causes of these two events were floatables entering the rivers from diverse sources in 

 the New York region (MESA, 1977)and natural changes in the physical and biologi- 

 cal characteristics of the waters of the New York Bight, augmented by nutrient inputs 

 from the estuary and ocean outfalls and to a lesser extent from ocean dumping 

 (Swanson and Sindermann, 1979). Therefore, the Congress reacted in 1977 by 

 enacting an amendment to the Marine Protection Research and Sanctuaries Act that 

 established a mandatory deadline of December 31, 1981, for the termination of 

 "harmfuTsewage sludge dumping in the ocean. This Congressional action was based 

 largely upon public misconceptions rather than scientific fact and did not consider 

 the impacts of land-based alternatives as fully as ocean dumping alternatives. The 

 deadline established by the 1977 amendment was not absolute but applied only to 

 sewage sludge that would "unreasonably degrade or endanger human health, wel- 

 fare, amenities or the marine environmental ecological systems or economic poten- 

 tialities" (PL 95-153, 33 USC S 1401). Despite this clear statement by the Congress 

 that dumping of some sewage sludges into the ocean after 1981 was acceptable, 

 provided that unreasonable degradation did not occur, the amendment has been 

 consistently misinterpreted in the public arena as an absolute ban on all dumping of 

 all sewage sludges. 



As we have described, during the period between 1970 and 1976 two real environ- 

 mental crises preceded by one imaginary environmental crisis occurred in the New 

 York Bight. Sewage sludge is an inherently aesthetically displeasing substance to our 

 society. Therefore, it is not surprising that the media were able to generate consider- 

 able public concern when it appeared likely that the sewage sludge would affect Long 

 Island beaches. The technical information gathered and reviewed when the moving 

 of the dumpsites was considered indicated that sewage sludge dumping in the New 

 York Bight apex contributed only a minor portion of the contaminant inputs causing 

 environmental degradation and the potential for environmental crises (U.S. Envi- 

 ronmental Protection Agency, 1978). The institutional response to the 1976 oxygen 

 depletion and beach pollution events did not take into account this technical infor- 

 mation, since the single governmental action was to establish a statutory deadline for 

 phasing out ocean dumping of sewage sludge. While stoppage of sewage sludge 

 dumping will diminish inshore eutrophication minimally and reduce toxicant 

 loadings to some extent, the other anthropogenic sources dominate impacts upon 

 the Bight. There has been no comparable regulatory action to minimize the discharge 

 of floatable materials or toxicants to the estuary and Bight. 



Dredged Material/ Bioaccumulation — The waters in New York Harbor are natu- 

 rally shallow, and dredging is required to maintain channels deep enough for the safe 

 navigation of ships. For about 200 years, open water disposal sites located near the 



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