Dredge dumping

A federal appeals court today scuttled New York State’s hope of blocking the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency from establishing a new open water disposal site for dredged sediments in eastern Long Island Sound.

The federal lawsuit filed yesterday seeks to set aside the EPA's decision designating a permanent open water dumping site within 2.3 miles of Fishers Island in the Town of Southold.

New York State will sue the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to block designation of the eastern Long Island Sound as a permanent disposal site for dredged materials.

New York State will take legal action against the United States Environmental Protection Agency to prevent the designation of new permanent open water disposal sites off the coast of eastern Long Island, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced today at a press conference at Sunken Meadow State Park.

The federal government’s controversial plan to dump dredged materials in the Sound near Fishers Island will be the subject of public hearings Wednesday in Riverhead and Mattituck.

The federal EPA published a proposed new rule designating a two-square nautical mile area northwest of Fishers Island as a dredge material dump site which will be used for the next 30 years.

The dumping of dredged materials in the Long Island Sound will continue for the next 30 years under a controversial plan approved yesterday over the protests of local officials and environmental activists.

A new plan to continue dumping potentially toxic materials into the Sound would jeopardize the strides Long Island has made to improve its water quality, according to local environmentalists.

Millions of cubic yards of dredged materials would continue to be dumped in open water pits in L.I. Sound over the next 30 years under plan released yesterday by Army Corps of Engineers.