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Area beach warnings: 'Swim at your own risk'
The Sonoma County Department of Health Services has posted a warning sign advising the public of bacteria levels at Memorial Beach, in Healdsburg, on July 2, 2009.
Christopher Chung / The Press DemocratPublished: Friday, July 3, 2009 at 3:00 a.m.
Last Modified: Thursday, July 2, 2009 at 1:51 p.m.
High bacteria counts prompted public health warnings Thursday to stay out of the water at popular Russian River beaches in Healdsburg and Monte Rio.
Test results expected today will determine if the warning signs remain at Healdsburg’s Veterans Memorial Beach and Monte Rio Beach heading into the holiday weekend, officials said.
The river is not closed at either beach, as it would be in the case of a sewage spill, said Walter Kruse, Sonoma County Environmental Health director.
Instead, the warnings mean that bacteria counts exceed recommended levels, indicating a risk of gastrointestinal illness.
“It would be basically swim at your own risk,” Kruse said.
“Warning: swimming not advised,” was written on signs in English and Spanish at Memorial Beach.
The twice-weekly tests at 13 points along the river from Cloverdale to Monte Rio do not indicate the source of the bacteria, which could come, for example, from people “stirring up sediment, Kruse said.
Memorial Beach, a county park, happened to be closed Thursday for annual installation of lifeguard stations, buoys marking the swimming area and the summer dam, which creates a swimming lagoon.
Workers at the beach said it would be ready Friday for the start of the busy holiday weekend.
Monte Rio Beach drew a modest crowd Thursday and was packed last weekend, with people and their dogs in the water and with the warnings posted, said Roberta Pollard, Monte Rio Recreation and Park administrator.
The beach is hosting a water carnival today and Saturday, which has Pollard hoping the water gets a clean bill of health.
“I’m hoping it won’t be an issue at all,” she said.
Johnson’s Beach in Guerneville, another popular spot on the lower river, was posted for high bacteria levels in six tests from June 16-25, but within limits in samples taken Tuesday, according to county records.
“We got a nice clear reading now,” a worker at Johnson’s Beach said Thursday.
The elevated bacteria findings renewed concerns that low summertime river flows approved by the state Water Resources Control Board could lead to contamination, especially in the swimming lagoons impounded behind summer dams.
“I’d say that is a very strong concern,” Pollard said.
The level of enterococcus, a bacteria from animal waste, exceeded the standards at Memorial Beach and at Monte Rio Beach on Tuesday, the most recent tests posted on the Web site. Both the enterococcus and E. coli levels exceeded standards at Monte Rio Beach on June 23. At Johnson’s Beach the enterococcus level was over the limit as recently as last week.
The kiddie swimming area at Monte Rio Beach also had high enterococcus and E. coli levels from June 18-25.
Starting Monday, the Sonoma County Water Agency has the authority to reduce flows below Dry Creek near Healdsburg to as low as 35 cubic feet per second (cfs), a level that hasn’t been seen along the river in at least three decades.
On Thursday, the river flow at Healdsburg was 115 cfs and 103 cfs at Hacienda Bridge below Forestville.
The water agency will “do everything in our power” to keep river flows above the minimum, spokesman Brad Sherwood said.
But he acknowledged that circumstances, such as a heat wave and a drawdown of water from Lake Mendocino near Ukiah, could prompt lower flows.
The water agency is required to participate in testing the river for bacteria and nutrients to assess the “health issues” related to lowered flows, Sherwood said.
If any such issues are detected, the agency is required to “immediately respond,” but the state order does not specify what should be done, he said. “That’s a good thing,” Sherwood said. “It gives us flexibility.”
Kruse, the environmental health director, said there is no known connection between low river flows and bacteria contamination. “That’s why we’re conducting the tests,” he said.
The three bacteria measured in river water tests — enterococcus, E. coli and total coliforms — are not disease agents, Kruse said. Rather, they are “indicator organisms” suggesting that people swimming in the water are at risk for gastrointestinal disease, he said.
The tests simply indicate the concentration of bacteria in the water column, Kruse said. “You don’t know where it came from,” he said.
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