Join the fight for your right to know if and when your river is contaminated by sewage...and fight for the funds needed to end the dumping of raw sewage in our nation's waterways!  Ask your Congressmen to co-sponsor the Raw Sewage Community Right to Know legislation. The text of the petition is shown below.

There are two ways you can submit the petition to your US legislators:

• Print the petition yourself to sign and mail. Click here to download a PDF version of the document, then locate the names and addresses of your US Representative and Senators by following links on our Take Action webpage.
  
• Give us your information and we will deliver it for you. Please provide your information in the boxes below the petition. We will deliver your petition to your legislators in time for consideration.

Dear Connecticut River watershed Congressperson,

We, the undersigned, ask you to co-sponsor the Raw Sewage Overflow Community Right-to-Know Act (H.R. 2452 / S.B. 2080).  Billions of gallons of sewage-laced pollution spill into the Connecticut River each year.  We deserve to know when our rivers are not safe to recreate in.  We urge you to support this Act.

Although there are alert systems for a variety of public health threats, ranging from bad air pollution days to tainted food outbreaks, there currently are no federal requirements for wastewater treatment plants to promptly warn the public when there is a sewage spill or overflow. This is an outrage, especially since this pollution threatens the lives and health of millions of Americans.  The economic impacts are significant.  Losses across the country due to swimming-related illnesses are estimated at $28 billion annually.  Public notification and reporting is needed so people like me will have the information necessary to protect our families and the rivers we love.

Notification, monitoring and reporting would save millions of Americans from getting sick every year. The federal legislation we seek would help reduce the annual number of human illnesses and deaths from contact with raw sewage by informing Americans of sewer overflows discharging waste into local waterways.

In the Connecticut River watershed, it would require communities like Hartford CT, Holyoke MA, Chicopee MA, and Springfield MA to report Combined Sewer Overflow discharges to the public, to health officials, and to regulatory agencies right after they happen.  Wastewater treatment systems that have a burst pipe or some other event that sends raw sewage into waterways (like what happened in April 2007 in Westfield, MA or in January 2008 in Cromwell, CT) would likewise have to notify the public.  Presently in the watershed, Vermont is the only state that has an adequate system in place for public notification of sewage discharges.

It is time Americans are informed when sewage fouls our rivers.  Please co-sponsor this important Raw Sewage Overflow Community Right-to-Know legislation today.