Sewage Discharge by Recreational Boats in R.I. Coastal Waters

Federal legislation regulating sewage from recreational boats has existed since 1972 (The Clean Water Act). Since that time the regulations have failed to prevent untreated sewage from boats from being discharged into the Nation\u27s waterways. This has caused conflicts over water quality, particularly in shellfish growing areas. The regulatory system which exists to regulate sewage from recreational boats was analyzed for nine sources of possible regulatory failure. Seven of the nine were found to be operating. They include, lack of technology, lack of enforcement, lack of issue salience, negative attitudes on the part of the boaters, the economics of compliance, conflicting interest groups, and administrative errors. At the time the regulations were promulgated several other regulatory options were available to the implementing agency. Seven of these options, ranging from no federal regulations to strict controls on boat numbers were analyzed for their potential effectiveness. To achieve the goal of improved water quality, mandating only type I marine sanitation devices, or only type III marine sanitation devices could have been more effective than the current regulations. Eliminating regulations for boats less than 65 feet in length would be the easiest to implement, but ignores water quality issues. Opting to use a strict formula method resolves some of the water quality issues and implementation problems. Other options, mixing state and federal responsibility, would be equally ineffective or worse than the current system in protecting water quality. The lack of effective federal regulations resulted in the use of a standard formula (Food and Drug Administration) by state shellfish sanitation officials. This formula limits boat numbers based upon predicted sewage loads using several assumptions. Data from a mail-return survey and shoreside observations of Rhode Island boaters administered during the summer, 1988, were used to modify the occupancy rate assumptions of the standard formula