GET ME REWRITE: 24 years later, Key West Florida has finally addressed its sewage problem

 

City of Key West

That was then:  New York Times, 9/28/1999

(from Retiring Guy's clippings files

This is now:  People's World, 12/20/2022

Earlier this year, Key West completed a $67.3 million project for a wastewater collection system and Advanced Wastewater Treatment facility. The project, originally planned for seven years, was accelerated to a three-year schedule due to the prevalence of beach health advisories warning of high levels of fecal bacteria. 

Such bacteria ends up in the ocean from runoff and leaking sewage systems. 

Much of Key West’s old system’s piping was made of iron, steel, and clay and dated back to the 1800s. Those pipes have all been replaced with PVC, and all septic tanks and cesspits have been removed from the island. 

This is good news for residents in the lower Florida Keys who, like 25 million other Americans, had been “drinking worse water” than was found at wastewater treatment plants. Thousands of homes had not been connected to the central sewage system and leaked untreated sewage into the ground and ocean.

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