Water, Water Everywhere, Including The Basements

Home for sale. Pool in basement.

Actually, the basement is a pool and the front yard is a lake.

But not by design.

The basement of Diane Blumel’s home, north of Spokane off Lowe Road in the Eaglewood subdivision, filled with 14 inches of murky water on New Year’s Day. It’s not a new problem, and she’s not the only one running a pump 10 hours a day trying to keep ahead of the flood.

About 250 residents of the Peone Pines and Eaglewood neighborhoods gathered Wednesday night at Colbert Elementary School to swap horror stories, and to try to determine who’s to blame, what it will take to fix the mess and who’s going to pay.

Part of the problem is an underground clay bowl that acts like a giant liner, preventing storm runoff from soaking deep into the ground, Spokane County engineer Steve Worley told the group.

As more homes are built, more septic systems installed and more lawns are watered, the bowl fills with groundwater, then overflows into basements and streets.

Some are worried that the new Mount Spokane High School being built on Peone Prairie will add to the problem.

Spokane County commissioners recently approved $70,000 to study the problem.

Frustrated residents say the county has known about the flood risk since 1980, but continued to approve new development in the area.

An engineering report compiled 17 years ago warned of a potentially serious flood problem. It recommended county engineers implement a plan to divert, store and dispose of water contributing to the flooding.

Neighbors also discovered a 1990 county resolution requiring a storm water collection and dispersal system for the Eaglewood development.

None was ever installed, say neighbors.

“It’s hard to understand how that is related to the issue at hand,” said Brenda Sims, county stormwater utility manager. “The issue is the rising groundwater. We are seeing a pattern of flooded basements,” she said.

“There isn’t more water falling out of the sky. They are importing water, flushing it down the toilets and watering lawns. Whether you put it into a dry well or a pond, it is still going into the ground,” she said.

Dry wells - concrete drums drilled with holes and set in gravel to collect storm water and release it into the ground, were installed. But they don’t work because of the rising groundwater.

In the meantime, water fills streets, yards and basements. Since septic fields are failing, residents are worried the water might be contaminated.

E. coli was reported in a backyard water sample taken to the health department by a family on Peone Pines Drive. Later tests, however, didn’t show any of the bacteria.

Blumel says she first noticed flood problems in July 1993 when her house was under construction. Part of Lowe Road was covered with water and there was water in her basement.

This year her basement has been flooded since November. A pump runs constantly.

“An engineer told me to abandon my basement, just cement it up,” said Blumel.

Unfortunately, the hot-water heater and furnace are in the basement. They’ll have to be moved upstairs.

“I’m losing my basement, and I lose my fourth bedroom upstairs,” she complained.

“I never would have bought here if I knew about this. We were assured that the flooding was a completely freak thing,” Blumel said.

“Now everybody is talking to each other. It’s been a problem longer than we thought and it’s more widespread. And it can happen any time of year.

Fixing the neighborhood’s drainage problem could cost $700,000, Worley said. Neighbors would have to pay the bill.

“We can’t spend public money on private property,” the engineer said.

Sims said public workshops will be scheduled to figure out how the project will be funded.

Connecting the neighborhoods to the county sewer system might ease the problem, but would cost about $5 million.

The subdivisions are outside the county’s “priority sewer area,” and there are no plans to extend sewer service there for at least 20 years, Worley said.

, DataTimes