Very late on Thursday night into Friday morning, and then again later on Friday, southeastern Wisconsin was pounded with severe thunderstorms and torrential rains.
Milwaukee does not handle heavy rain very well.
From the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:
A deluge overwhelmed municipal sewers across the Milwaukee area Friday and caused backups in hundreds of basements, leaving frustrated residents to clean up a foul and potentially costly mess.
The flooded-basement tally in Milwaukee reached 281 by 3:30 p.m., and that's just the number who called the city's Flood Control Center. Similar flooding spread across much of Wauwatosa, said Department of Public Works Director Bill Kappel, who expected to get an informal count by checking the debris piled at the curbs over the weekend.
Sewage and storm water flooded another 50 basements in Brookfield and Elm Grove, and seeped into a storage room in the Milwaukee County medical examiner's office, at N. 9th St. and W. Highland Ave. in Milwaukee.
...The aging sanitary and storm-sewer system was unable to handle the deluge: 4.52 inches of rain on the north side of the city; and 2.77 inches on the south side. At times, the rain fell at more than 2 inches per hour, said Chris Franks, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Sullivan.
"The sewers are not built to handle that much water in a short period of time," said Robert Brooks, sewer service manager for Milwaukee.
The massive amount of water seeped through cracks in the sewer laterals and main pipes, then flowed back into homes, often combining with sewer water. Any blockage in the laterals from homes to the main pipes compounded the problem.
...On the southwest side, Dana Carpenter contended with the all-too-familiar effects of nature through a rain-soaked night.
When a neighbor near S. 62nd St. and W. Harrison Ave. knocked at 2 a.m., Carpenter knew what was going on.
"Whenever there is a flash-flood warning, all of the sewage backs up. Six or seven houses have the problem," she said.
Carpenter went down to her basement and saw sewage and water bubbling up through utility storm drains, even an old drain that used to be attached to an old sink.
The same thing happened last year.
"Last year was the worst," she said. "About three feet of water. We lost everything - water heater, furnace and more personal property than I can count."
Carpenter's family learned from that disaster - most everything is up on stilts in the basement now.
Her husband is a police officer, so they have to live in the city because of residency restrictions. Carpenter was asked the obvious question after two years of sewage backups.
"Would I love to move? Absolutely. Is it feasible anytime soon? No," she said.
Here's the story of a family that has had its basement flooded for two years in a row.
What a nightmare!
Even with massive dumping by MMSD, some sewage still manages to stay out of rivers and the lake and ends up bubbling up into people's homes.
The Journal Sentinel weaves the heavy rain and sewer backups into a discussion of the residency requirement.
As the JS tells it, Dana Carpenter has no choice but to deal with sewage in her basement.
She's a victim of the residency requirement. Her husband is a police officer. If he wants to keep his job they can't move. They're trapped.
Carpenter was asked the obvious question after two years of sewage backups.
"Would I love to move? Absolutely. Is it feasible anytime soon? No," she said.
Agree or disagree with the residency requirement. That's not the point.
Why would JS reporters Don Walker and Tom Held use a flooded basement to rail against the residency requirement?
Earlier in their article, they say that residents of 281 homes in Milwaukee had reported basement flooding. Since not all residents with rainwater or sewage or a blend in their basements call the Flood Control Center, let's double that number. Triple it. Let's say 1000 homes were flooded. Make it 2000. Make it 3000.
That still means the overwhelming majority of Milwaukee homes did not flood. Certainly, sewer backups did not affect most of the homes.
In fact, according to this real estate website, there are 2,885 properties currently on the market in the city of Milwaukee right now.
I bet the Carpenters could move to a home that might be less prone to sewer backups and still be within the city limits. By Dana Carpenter's own admission, 6 or 7 homes have the problem in her area.
Don't misunderstand me. I feel terribly sorry for anyone with flooding problems and sewer backups. It is truly a nightmare. It's absolutely awful.
But let's be fair. The residency requirement isn't keeping the Carpenters in that particular problem home.
If Walker and Held want to insert a little editorial on residency restrictions in their article on flooding due to the heavy rains, they should at least take the time to make sure that they're making a valid point.
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