New York City to stop muddy water discharge into Lower Esopus Creek from Ashokan Reservoir – Daily Freeman

New York City Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner Rohit Aggarwala, center, explains that all turbidity from the Ashokan Reservoir will remain in the reservoir during a press conference at Olive Reservoir on Monday, July 1, 2024. (Photo by William J. Kemble)

OLIVE, NY – The New York City Department of Environmental Protection announced Monday that it will end all discharges of muddy water into Lower Esopus Creek for operational purposes.

The stunning announcement was made by Commissioner Rohit Aggarwala at a news conference outside the west basin of the Ashokan Reservoir, where the often murky water was previously sent into a drainage channel because city officials wanted to avoid having to build a filtration plant.

“DEP has put a lot of effort into improving our water supply and everything they’ve been able to do with … those investments has created more flexibility, more redundancy and more resiliency in how we deliver water to New York City,” he said.

Jeremy Cherson, Riverkeeper’s senior director of government affairs, expressed the relief felt by city officials after the announcement and described how the 32-mile-long Lower Esopus Creek was disparagingly named after a chocolate soft drink.

“Some locals have long called the lower Esopus River Yoo-hoo Creek,” he said, holding up a bottle and showing a jar of clear water. “You can see why. It’s amazing that we’re about to go from this level of mud to … (something) that’s almost indistinguishable from drinking water.”

City officials said the change was made possible by updated water flow systems and tunnel improvements as well as work at the Croton Reservoir.

“Two significant changes were the connection of the Delaware Aqueduct with the Catskill Aqueduct… (and) the completion of the Croton Water Filtration Plant in the Bronx in 2015,” said Acting DEC Commissioner Sean Mahar.

New York City has been under a consent decree from the state Department of Environmental Conservation since it was ordered to pay $2.74 million in October 2012 for discharging up to 600 million gallons of muddy water daily from October 2010 to February 2011. That was repeated, albeit with state consent, a year later. In the decade since, there has been some animosity among the seven municipalities that are part of the Lower Esopus Creek waterway.

The late Vernon Benjamin, a historian and former Saugerties city administrator, called it an “industrial scar.” That sentiment was echoed by many who could see satellite images of the muddy water pouring into the Hudson River as a brown plume.

Ulster County Executive Jennifer Metzger was among local leaders who called the announcement a cause for celebration, more than 12 years after one of her predecessors, Michael Hein, said city officials were acting like an “occupying nation” by releasing water that was hurting Ulster County’s economy. She praised the city for agreeing to a zero-turbidity requirement while maintaining its goals of keeping reservoir levels low when necessary to prevent flooding downstream.

“To say the relationship has been complicated and difficult at times is probably an understatement, but … DEP’s proposed revisions to the (protocols) use innovative thinking to re-model and allow for cleaner, higher-quality water from the East Basin to be used to address turbidity issues,” she said.

Among the local leaders most affected by the turbidity are Saugerties Town Supervisor Fred Costello and Village Mayor Bill Murphy. They have watched the community’s aesthetics be ruined by muddy water flowing past a hotel that worked hard to have a romantic scenic view, ending winter recreation like ice fishing and leaving year-round residue that has formed on shoreline trees.

“I can’t wait to cross the bridge (U.S. Route 9W) without having to look left or right to see how muddy the water is,” Murphy said.

Ulster Town Supervisor James Quigley, in a telephone interview, thanked state Sen. Michelle Hinchey, D-Saugerties, for ensuring that concerns raised by town leaders were taken seriously by town officials.

“This is a historic decision based on the scientific analysis that the supervisors recommended the city undertake,” he said. “It was clear to the supervisors that, while we were collectively respected, our message was not going anywhere. (Hinchey) established a relationship that I think was very healthy in this situation.”