Residents and visitors are reminded that all fluids and solids that are washed or dropped down the Storm Drains within the Village of Pelham and other neighboring communities, ends up in the Hutchinson River and the Long Island Sound.  The Long Island Sound is a diverse ecology for fish, wildlife, plants, and it is used in summer as a recreational resource for boating, fishing and swimming.

Here are some helpful hints you can follow to help clean up our local waterways:

Please clean up after your dog -- after you have picked up the wasted in a bag or paper, do not drop it down the catch-basin.  The bags accummulate creating blockages, contribute to flooding, and if they wash down to Long Island Sound, they contribute to bacterial contamination and algae blooms, which cause hypoxia and fish-kills.

Please do not dump chemicals, or used oil, or similar fluids down the storm-drains.

Please Do -- take your unused chemicals to a Westchester County Chemical Clean-up Day, listed at the following website.

http://www.westchestergov.com/envfacil/2003HCCDFlier.htm

Please Do -- use less fertilizer and insecticides, or ask your landscaper to use less fertilizer and insecticides, when caring for your lawns.  These chemicals wash into the storm-drains and wash down to Long Island Sound, where they contribute to pollution, contamination and algae blooms, which cause hypoxia, fish kills and beach-closings.

For more information, please visit the following websites:

www.epa.gov/npdes/stormwater

or

www.epa.gov/nps

or

www.dec.state.ny.us/website/dow/mainpage.htm

© 2004 Village of Pelham. All rights reserved