Neighborhood Water Watch

UCR's newest monitoring program is Neighborhood Water Watch, a collaborative program between UCR and neighborhood groups in our watershed with the goal of improving water quality in urban streams and protecting human health in the surrounding communities. Many of the streams flowing through metro Atlanta neighborhoods and into the Chattahoochee River are polluted with high levels of bacteria due to cracked and overflowing sewers, failing septic systems, and urban runoff.

While the settlement of UCR’s 1995 lawsuit against the City of Atlanta will resolve the major sewer overflow problems, there is still a need to investigate hot spot areas of contamination in the city and other jurisdictions and work with local governments and neighborhood groups and leaders to stop this public health threat and restore our streams.

With the assistance of generous support from two local foundations, we were able to purchase Idexx total coliform and E. coli testing lab equipment. Fecal coliform bacteria, including E. coli, are a group of bacteria that inhabit the intestinal tract of warm-blooded animals. The presence of fecal coliform bacteria in water indicates fecal contamination of the water by a warm-blooded animal and harmful bacteria associated with fecal contamination may also be present. Elevated bacteria levels are a common indicator of sewage leaks and spills into waterways and the data can indicate the number and type of pathogens present in the water.

This state of the art lab equipment is EPA-approved and will prove to be an invaluable tool for UCR to respond to Hotline calls and identify sources of sewage contamination. Thank you to our generous donors for making this program possible!

For more information about this program, contact UCR's Technical Program's Director, Jason Ulseth.

Photo courtesy of the Buckhead Reporter.