Community-Based Recreational Water Quality Monitoring Toolkit
Conducting and Environmental Health and Safety Survey (EHSS)
The Environmental Health and Safety Survey (EHSS) is a key component for creating a recreational water quality monitoring program that is safe and effectively monitors your local water. This is the first step to completing a monitoring program, since it allows you to assess if your site is safe to enter.
SECTION ONE
Conduct an Environmental Health and Safety Survey
An Environmental Health and safety survey (EHSS) is:
“The foundation or "blueprint" for designing and implementing an effective risk management plan for recreational waters. It is a comprehensive search for, and assessment of, existing and potential water quality hazards (biological, chemical and physical) and their associated risks to the health and safety of the public at designated beach areas”
Conducting an EHSS is recommended in the Canadian Recreational Water Quality Guidelines (2012). It is considered best practice to conduct an EHSS annually to protect the health and safety of site water users.
You can follow our step-by-step guide, which will walk you through all the steps for completing an EHSS.
Associated Resources (please review the guide for instructions on how to use these resources):
Download the EHSS step-by-step guide
Final report template link
EHSS in-field Survey link
Now that you have a plan, you’re ready to prepare the documents you’ll need to collect, store, and share data from your monitoring work. Section Two outlines what documents you’ll need to customize from the toolkit before you head out to monitor the water.
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