Lynn

Water and Sewer Timeline in Lynn

YEAR | Pollution first documented in the press

1912 | Press documents discussion of Stacey's Brook being driven underground: “The brook, which is no more than 75 yards in length, is considered being one of the most disagreeable and unhealthful brooks flowing through a thickly settled residential part of the city....The neighbors effected by the stream say there is no reason why it could not be filled with gravel and have the meadow drained off by a sewer pipe.”

1957 | Press from the Daily Evening Item: "Stacey Brook Pollution Closes King’s Beach Area; Raw Sewage from Lynn System Empties into Stream, then Ocean"

1976 | USEPA and DOJ sues the city of Lynn for Clean Water Act violations related to its sewer system.

1982 | the MA Legislature passes Chapter 381 of Acts of 1982 creating the Lynn Water & Sewer Commission, which takes ownership of the sewer system.

1987 | LSWC enters into First Modified Consent Decree with USEPA and DOJ. A Consent Decree is a court settlement. This begins the process of separating the combined sewers which handle both sewage and stormwater and occur throughout the city.

1990s | Lynn spends $Million dollars to separate sewer connections from stormwater connections; sewer goes to LWSC sewage treatment plant; rain and runoff goes to the beach

March 2001 | LWSC enters into Second Modified Consent Decree with USEPA and DOJ. This requires the separation of areas including those impacting Kings Beach.

Summer 2001 | New MA Department of Public Health regulations require monitoring of beach water during the beach season at all public beaches. Beaches are required to be tested at one location at least weekly.  DCR, which manages the Lynn side of Kings Beach, tests the beach weekly from Memorial Day to July 4th and then daily until Labor Day.  DCR tests four locations: the outfall and three beach water locations spanning the beach.

2012 | USEPA orders LWSC to make efforts to identify Kings Beach pollution sources which were apparently missed with the work done in early 2000s.

2017 | LWSC enters into Third Modified Consent Decree with USEPA and DOJ. This requires the separation of areas in other parts of the city in addition to more work in the Kings Beach area.

UPCOMING WORK

ONGOING | For Kings Beach area, LWSC is currently working with Environmental Partners to send video cameras down the entire stormwater system that empties into the Lynn pipe that discharges onto Kings Beach. Illicit sewage connections will be identified and corrected. 3 miles remain in this project as of November 2024.

ONGOING | Currently, LWSC is currently working on separating CSO 5, constructing a new $75 million wastewater treatment plant, and a large $30 million pump station on Commercial Street to help get wastewater to the plant. The pump station will help relieve sanitary sewer overflows in West Lynn. 

2030 | CSO 5 in West Lynn is supposed to be separated by 2030 according to the Third Modified Consent Decree. 

NO DATE | There is no date yet for separating CSO 3 and 4. It seems likely to be sometime in the later 2030s at the earliest and will cost tens or hundreds of millions of dollars.