Untreated sewage is being pumped out to sea near the popular bathing spot Tobacco Bay, according to concerned residents

And St. George's Mayor E. Michael Jones is calling on Government to either provide a new treatment facility for the town, or pipe the problem across to the Southside treatment plant.spoke to two witnesses who saw the sewage floating dangerously close to the bay at the weekend.

A Bourne Drive resident, who did not want to be named said: "The sewage line in broken and sewage is coming right on the rocks."

The sewage could be seen from her porch "bubbling up right out of the ocean".

"The Corporation of St. George's has always had a lot of trouble with those sewage lines ? the strong smell happens a lot," she said.

And she said her neighbourhood smelled of sewage when the wind was blowing from the north.

A workman at a nearby home who also did not wish to be named said yesterday that he saw the slick on Sunday too.

"It was a rusty greenish colour, and looked like an oil slick," he said.

"It looks like a school of fish or a whale going under the surface or something, but then I realised what it was.

He said people still caught fish off the rocks around Bourne Drive.

"It will blow right into Tobacco Bay when the wind is right," he said.

Yesterday Mr. Jones said that there was a problem with sewage in the old town - and that it was compounded by cruise ships in the area.

"It's untreated ? it's the way the town was designed," he explained.

He said the sewage ran into the town with gravity into a building near the Town Hall, off King's Square.

Then the untreated sewage was "pumped up the hill out to Tobacco Bay".

Rather than a continuous flow out to sea, the untreated sewage collects in the central tank and is periodically pumped out to sea.

A better way to get rid of the Old Town's waste would be to set up a sewage treatment plant in the town, or pipe the sewage under St. George's Harbour to the closest treatment facility in Southside, St. David's.

He agreed this would be "a much better way", but the Corporation of St. George's could not cover the cost of building a treatment facility.

"We are not in the position to drive it ourselves," he said.

And he said St. George's residents had been getting rid of their sewage this way "all my life".

Mr. Jones predicted that when the old Holiday Inn hotel and adjoining Anchorage Road Villas, even more sewage will be produced so they could help with the cost for a new plant or pipe.

Mr. Jones said a worker from the Corporation of St. George's went up to the site.

"We have called the diving company to study the pipe on shore to see if anything needs to be addressed," Mr. Jones said.

But even though no discoloration could be seen in the water, he said the smell of the sewage could be caused by a "number of things".

He said there was construction work commencing at the Anchorage Road Houses recently and he believed someone had "severed a pipe up there".

It could be a gas leak, he said.

But he admitted the sewage smell was something that happened from time to time.

"Sometimes you get it and sometimes you don't," he said. "This is not the first time".

"There is a discharge of sewage that enters into the ocean. If someone stood there from sunrise to sundown, they would see various things. But if you did see something it would be 20 or 50 feet off shore," he said.

He said the reports of sewage coming close to shore and a strong smell of effluence was an "ongoing problem".

The underwater pipe extends 1,000 feet underwater, but the sewage was a perennial problem.

"You can go out there all year round (and see it)," he said.

But he said whether or not the sewage can be seen above the water depended on the strength of the "batch" of sewage coming down the pipe.

The Corporation of St. George's indicated the brown slick could have been caused by run-off from a local dairy farm.

But Mr. Jones said the "outflow of the pipe is an area to the west off Fort St. Catherine".

"The Limas are from the other side (of the promontory)," he said and indicated it would be "difficult to get around there."

The Mayor said the sewage outflow pipe was a "problem and a nuisance" but said it was up to "Government to come up with a sustainable alternative" to flushing their toilets in the ocean.

"If I was living there I would not want to smell it," he said.