Hamilton Township council has asked the local health unit to test the Gore’s Landing wharf swimming area if beaches at Bewdley and Harwood are posted as being unsafe for swimming.

With a recent road tar spill in Harwood at Rice Lake and a sewage spill in Peterborough entering the lake via the Otonabee River earlier this year, Deputy Mayor Isobel Hie pressed for this at Tuesday’s council meeting, as did Councillor Pat McCourt.

“People still swim there,” Hie said. “There is the potential for something to happen.”

Earlier this summer, councillors were informed the public swimming area at Gore’s Landing would no longer be tested by health inspectors from the Haliburton, Kawartha, Pine Ridge District Health Unit. A letter stated it did not fit the criteria that included having a lifeguard, a swimming program and public swimming area. Council asked that the health unit justify the change to them and a representative came to Tuesday’s meeting.

Atul Jain, manager of environmental health for the local health unit, explained that an entire review of testing at public swimming areas through the three county area the health unit covers found eight public health inspectors were testing at 61 beaches, taking more than 4,000 samples per summer. With other program duties and those time demands, the decision was made to reduce testing at some of the public bathing areas based on a set criteria and testing history. Water testing at Gore’s Landing was eliminated because its testing results have improved over recent years to the point that the area was not posted as unsafe for swimming at all in 2009, he said.

The township council improved the swimming area at Bewdley and it is now “one of the star beaches in the county,” Jain also informed council.

But Hie was unsure of what this meant for Gore’s Landing, and McCourt wanted assurances that if both Bewdley’s and Harwood’s swimming areas were posted as unsafe for swimming, that the health unit would test at Gore’s Landing, too.

Certainly the numbers are better at Gore’s Landing, Mayor Mark Lovshin noted, and he pointed to the praise the health unit manager was heaping on the improvement at Bewdley.

Jain said he would look into the scenario councillors described in their request for testing at Gore’s Landing if tests resulted in the closure of Bewdley and Harwood beaches.

via Hamilton Township wants water at Gore’s Landing wharf tested – Northumberland Today – Ontario, CA.