Pick a spot in New York and you're probably close to a beautiful body of water. While we enjoy it by taking in the view on a pretty sunny day or drinking clean water, it comes with some dangers as well.

“Algal blooms are a specific problem," state Sen. Rachel May said. "They happen in a particular place, but they are highly toxic.”  

An algal bloom is a significant growth of algae in a body of water. Not all of them are dangerous, but a harmful algal bloom develops when toxic-producing algae grows excessively.   

“Harmful algal blooms can happen during your hot summer days, when there’s not a lot of current in the water,” said Joseph Awald, commissioner of water for the city of Syracuse.

Harmful algal blooms can affect drinking water, potentially making consumers sick, or even giving them trouble breathing. With the official start of summer next month, May and other local and state leaders have that risk in mind and are looking to address it.   

"My bill is called the HABMAP, so harmful algal bloom monitoring and prevention," May said.     

The idea of the bill, which passed the Senate earlier this month, is to provide more resources to monitor algal blooms in bodies of water across the state.   

“It is really important that they be able to monitor them, but also important that we're collecting the information about all the lakes in this state so that we know how big a problem this is,” May said.

Awald helps monitor Skaneateles Lake weekly, and says the level of algae in the water has been low for the last several years. However, he noted the importance of monitoring all bodies of water in the state.

“We’re taking samples of the water at the surface and at our intakes," Awald said. "We send them to a lab to get certified on what, if any, harmful algal blooms are in the water. And we only do that during the summer because the harmful algal blooms only happen during the warm months.”  

May also mentioned how they can learn more about algal blooms through monitoring. Are there locations where they’re repeatedly popping up? Is there a common factor causing them? That’s two questions she’s hoping to answer moving forward.

May’s bill still needs to pass the Assembly before going to the governor.