Dr. Nancy Gassman, an environmental scientist who presented to the Fort Lauderdale Marine Advisory Board on Dec. 4, said long-term monitoring shows clear nutrient improvements in parts of the North Fork of the New River after wastewater treatment plants stopped discharging in the 1980s, but bacterial compliance and phosphorus remain concerns.

Gassman outlined county quarterly monitoring from 1973 to 1997 and modern results through 2025. "When we stopped discharging treated effluent into the river, nitrogen fell below the standard," she said, adding that dissolved oxygen improved while phosphorus did not consistently meet benchmarks. She noted that the cessation of chlorinated effluent occasionally revealed persistent bacterial problems that are not explained solely by past wastewater emissions.

On modern testing, Gassman summarized molecular-source tracking done by Broward County and analyzed by Miami Waterkeeper: human gene markers in some samples are often below EPA swimming-threshold estimates, while dog-marker signals are frequently stronger. "The molecular source testing is telling you it's not human or it's not so much human bacteria that it's not safe to swim," she said, while also noting that routine enterococci testing (the city's weekly metric) cannot distinguish sources.

City staff described steps already taken: boots-on-the-ground watershed inspections, smoke testing of sewer mains to find leaks, closure of a stormwater outfall upstream of Sweeting Park, regular stormwater structure cleaning and two large water-quality capture devices, and contracting for a city-run molecular source-tracking program to test for human, dog and avian markers. Gassman recommended public-records requests to Broward County for historical dredging documentation when members asked whether spot-dredging removed historical sediments from the 1990s.

Board members and residents pressed for clarity on what the molecular tests mean for public-safety decisions and for records on dredging in the early 1990s. Gassman said that if bacteria were surviving in situ since 1992, that would be unlikely without regeneration in soils, and she recommended targeted testing and county records requests to verify past remediation.

The board asked staff to continue coordination with county and state monitoring groups and to report back with any new results from the city's planned molecular tracking. The board also discussed possible next steps to elevate the issue for broader interagency action.

The board closed the presentation with agreement to continue monitoring and to pursue records and additional analyses.