Ocean Ridge, FL - Florida Department of Health Palm Beach County has CANCELED aHEALTH ADVISORY for Ocean Inlet Park and Boynton Beach after recent sampling showed bacterial levels in the water to be less than 10 colonies per 100 milliliters of marine water putting these two beaches in the GOOD range.

Causes of the elevated level that prompted the advisory are unknown but are generally
associated with wildlife, heavy recreational usage, high surf from high winds and high tides or
runoff following heavy rains. The DOH-Palm Beach always encourages rinsing with fresh
water after swimming in any natural body of water.

Health department staff samples the beach waters at 13 locations from Boca Raton to Jupiter for
enterococci as recommended by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection and the
EPA. The samples are laboratory tested for concentrations and a value assigned to indicate
poor, moderate or good ranges.

Beach water quality for Palm Beach County and throughout the state can be found at
www.flhealthpalmbeach.org and click on “beach water quality”.

*A Poor rating may result in a resampling event to confirm poor conditions; otherwise a
Health Advisory will be issued immediately. These indicate that contact with the water at
this site may pose increased risk of infectious disease, particularly for susceptible
individuals

Beach Action Values (BAV) Enterococcus Results Description
Date of Resample: 7/12/2017

United States Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) recommended criteria for enterococci is:

• Good = 0-35 Enterococci per 100 milliliters of marine water,
• Moderate = 36-70 Enterococci per 100 milliliters of marine water,
• Poor = 71 or greater Enterococci per 100 milliliters of marine water