quote:
BROWNSVILLE -- It's a vital part of our everyday lives, were talking about water.
This afternoon the International Boundary and Water Commission held its regular public meeting.
One of the topics was bacteria in our river water.
Elizabeth Verdecchia, an Environmental Protection Specialist with the International Boundary and Water Commission says, "It's a small section of the river in pretty much downtown Brownsville, Matamoros"
Students at the University of Texas at Brownsville focused on intensive sampling, testing a 20 mile section of the river.
The sampling started up at River Bend Gulf all the way down to Monsees Road.
Testers found Bacteria samples or E-Coli, however the study didn't show where the contamination from.
Action 4 News asks Environmental Protection Specialist Verdecchia should the public be concerned.
Verdecchia says, " No I don't believe that the levels are at a level right now to be concerned.."
As far as your drinking water goes, officials tells us there's no need to worry, everything that comes from the river to the tap is treated.
For now staff members with the International Boundary and Water Commission just want people to be careful when going to the river for recreational purposes for example fishing and swimming.
Verdecchia says, "If you go to the river and swim just to be cautious about ingesting, you don have to be aware that the river is exceeding for contact recreation."
More studies will be done to determine where the contamination is coming from.
Action 4 news has also learned the bacterium wasn’t as high as previous years.
i will tell you what is not treated: pesticides and chemicals. it is just plain to expensive to treat those aspects. even college station does not have the resources to effectively control the amount of unnatural chemicals in our water.
like my hydrology professor said, "there are alot of fish being born right now that don't know if they are male or female but they are still just as happy"
yeah that was about the navasota river, imagine all the complications down the riogrande and brownsville getting the **** end of the stick.