The Massachusetts Water Resource Authority submitted its final court-ordered report on March 18, 2016, concluding more than 25 years of federal oversight regarding Boston Harbor’s water quality and remediation efforts.
Residents who spent their childhoods along Boston-area shores witnessed firsthand the water’s declining condition throughout the 1960s and 1970s. This deterioration reached a nadir when a notorious 1988 presidential campaign advertisement identified Boston Harbor as America’s most polluted.
Substantial improvements have followed, though the burden has fallen heavily on local ratepayers. Water bills that once ran a few hundred dollars annually have climbed into the thousands for many households. Cities such as Revere faced penalties in the hundreds of thousands of dollars to upgrade aging, inefficient water and sewer infrastructure.
The harbor’s transformation has been marked by ecological recovery. Marine life has returned in abundance, with seal populations now inhabiting the harbor and whales spotted off Revere’s coast in recent years.
Facilities including Constitution Beach in East Boston, which once closed repeatedly during summer heat waves due to unsafe conditions, now welcome swimmers. The Charles River, where a fall into the water once necessitated immediate tetanus vaccination in the 1970s, is now safe for recreation.
Organizations such as Save the Harbor/Save the Bay have shifted their focus from basic water quality advocacy to promoting the benefits of coastal living.
Yet significant challenges persist. Brownfields along waterways like the Mystic River continue leaching contaminants. The Wynn organization has invested tens of millions remediating the contaminated casino site in Everett. Boston homeowners in neighborhoods like the South End and Back Bay now spend thousands installing water filtration systems to manage roof runoff.
These developments represent over 30 years of sustained effort and billions in expenditure to restore acceptable water quality standards.
While optimism about the harbor’s future seems warranted, caution remains appropriate. Massachusetts politicians have demonstrated willingness to fund major public works but have shown less commitment to maintaining them. Deteriorating infrastructure and the transit system exemplify this pattern—billions invested in construction phases, then starved of maintenance funding.
With coastal populations growing, the water environment currently poses no public health threat. However, without continued vigilant monitoring of the water quality gains achieved through extraordinary public investment and effort, the region risks returning to an era of public danger and national shame, when the harbor inspired songs like “Love That Dirty Water” in the 1970s and earned designation as America’s most polluted in 1988.