Presentations, tour to look at runoff on Five Mile

Spokane County residents can get a look tonight at a preliminary design for a project to collect and dispose of storm runoff from Five Mile Prairie.

County Utility Division officials and consultants will present their plans at the North Spokane Library, 44 E. Hawthorne Road, at 6:30 p.m. after a bus tour of the Five Mile watershed.

The tour will begin at the library parking lot at 3 p.m. and will last about two hours. It will show how runoff, made worse by home construction on Five Mile Prairie, flows down the bluff and floods people’s basements.

County officials plan to resolve the problem by building five “cells,” or ponds, on vacant property at the intersection of Wall Street and Price Avenue, about one block north of Country Homes Boulevard.

Water will be channeled into a settling basement on the south side of Price Avenue, where sediment will be removed. Then the water will be transferred to four ponds on the other side of Price, where it will be allowed to soak into the ground.

Utility Division Manager Brenda Sims said the project will be phased, and only the sediment basin and one of the ponds on the north side of Price will be built this year.

Plans call for a walking trail through the area, which is to provide habitat for deer and birds.”We are hoping to refine the design” with more public input tonight, she said. About 20 seats on a 40-seat bus remain available for this afternoon’s tour. To reserve a seat, call Melissa Burchell at (509) 477-7486.