FAIRHOPE, Alabama—Not long after a city environmental board met Wednesday to discuss what to do about water quality problems in the area, the Baldwin County health department issued four warnings for beaches from Daphne’s May Day Park to Orange Street Pier in Fairhope.

Public health warnings that swimming there could lead to increased risk of illness were also issued for Fairhope’s North Beach Park and Volanta Avenue beach.

Prior to the May 13 warnings, the Fairhope Environmental Advisory Board, a volunteer group appointed by the City Council, met that morning in downtown Fairhope to discuss the next phase of a research project aimed at finding the sources and solutions for water quality problems suspected of causing such warnings.

“The goal was to figure out the source of the problem and how to correct it,” Jim Horner, FEAB chairman, said yesterday morning of a study conducted during the past year. “The point is to correct the problem so that we don’t get beach advisories as frequently as we do.”

The swimming advisory was the second issued this year for Fairhope’s North Beach Park, a popular waterfront swimming area along the Eastern Shore. Last year, some six advisories were issued for that beach and nearby ones, stating that water quality was poor and swimming potentially dangerous to human health.

The Wednesday advisories followed torrential rains and flooding along the Eastern Shore last weekend.

The health department’s May 13 advisory for the four local beaches stated that water quality problems affecting human health in “recreational waters can increase during and immediately following rainstorms due to overflowing sewage collection and treatment facilities, storm water run-off, malfunctioning septic systems and agricultural run-off.”

Horner said the first part of the two-phase program had been completed, which was conducted by scientists at Auburn University and a local engineering firm for a total of about $32,000.

The group decided Wednesday to refine the next phase of the study to focus on where the majority of the water quality problems seem to be located: North Beach Park and Stack’s Gully, which runs into the bay near the municipal pier.

“We got a lot of good info from that study,” Horner said. “But it did not involve looking at sediment.”

Fecal pollution in sediment could be an issue due to the number of water fowl that frequent and stay at North Beach Park, he said.

The advisory board is expected to request funding for the second and final phase of the study at an upcoming council meeting. That request will be for approximately $100,000, he said.

“I think the study was a real eye-opener,” Councilwoman Debbie Quinn said at Monday’s council meeting. “When you look at the number of people who swim in the bay and engage in triathlons in Fairhope, it is something we need to get a handle on.”