Don’t break out the bathing suit and goggles just yet, but state regulators say the Comite River has become much cleaner, with work on preventing sewage from fouling it paying off.
For several years, the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality had the entire length of the river on a federal list of “impaired” waterways because of pollution.
And for more than a decade, the lowest section of the Comite, between Baker and Central, was on the list for high levels of bacteria associated with human and animal feces. By 2018, some individual tests had picked up bacteria concentrations three times the minimum standard to even ride in a boat.
But the Comite’s water quality has gradually improved. State officials announced recently the lowest section of the river is safe for boating, wading in shallow water and other forms of what’s known as “secondary contact recreation.”
A nearly decade-long effort to improve the maintenance of hundreds of individual home septic systems and treatment plants has cut the concentration of fecal bacteria significantly, agency officials said.
“Removing the Secondary Contact Recreation bacteria impairment for the Comite River watershed benefits the Baton Rouge and Central communities by keeping water clean for activities such as boating and wading,” Greg Waldron, an agency environmental scientist, said in a recent newsletter.
Due to lingering bacterial concentrations, however, the lowest section of the river between White Bayou and the Amite River still isn’t safe for swimming, which poses the risk of ingesting the water. That’s known as primary contact recreation.
The other portions of the river are now safe for swimming, boating or wading, according to the state.
Al Hindrichs, a DEQ senior environmental scientist, said the uppermost portion of the Comite was taken off “impaired status” for fecal bacteria in 2020 and the middle section north of Baker in 2016.
Fishing is safe, state agencies say, but the river water isn’t as supportive of fish populations as it could be. The Comite still has problems with oxygen levels, which support aquatic life, and with water clarity.
Beginning in southwestern Mississippi, the Comite flows past Clinton, Zachary, Baker, Central and parts of unincorporated East Baton Rouge Parish.
The river empties into the Amite River at BREC’s Frenchtown Road Conservation Area. The lowest section runs between Dyer Road near Baker and the Amite River near Central.
The lower section of the Comite drains 48,920 acres that have become increasingly urbanized, but many homeowners in that part of the river’s watershed aren’t on municipal sewer systems. They have individual treatment or septic systems to deal with sewage.
DEQ spent about $720,500 in federal and state dollars on the Capital Resource Conservation and Development Council, a regional nonprofit based in Hammond, to help homeowners maintain their sewage systems.
The conservation council has inspected 1,542 systems along the lower Comite. It found 567, a little more than a third, were not operating properly, and sent technicians to help owners repair 339 of them, the council reported.
Donny Latiolais, watershed coordinator for the conservation council, said inspectors fanned out street to street to identify problems, work with homeowners and initiate repairs.
“To be honest with you, most people don’t realize their system is not working,” he said.
Latiolais said that just showing people how to maintain their systems improved operation and compliance.
“Basically, with that, very few people did not want to comply,” he said.
The efforts have helped cause the average fecal bacteria concentrations to fall by almost three-quarters on the lower Comite, the council reported.
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