There’s an adage that says, “When it rains it pours.” Unfortunately, for far too many Detroiters, especially in recent years, when it rains, it not only pours but often causes major flooding on city streets and freeways and water backups in residential basements. While climate change has been blamed for the increase of eventful rainfalls in Detroit, a major reason for the massive floodings experienced by Detroit residents has been attributed to the City’s aging water and sewer infrastructure, much of which hasn’t been upgraded since the 1930s.
“That’s the big problem,” Gary Brown, Director of Detroit Water and Sewerage Department, told the Michigan Chronicle. “We are seeing these record rainfalls so often for a system that wasn’t built for this volume of rain. In a 10-year period, we have seen what was supposed to be 50, 100, 1,000-year floods, and the city’s systems just couldn’t manage the stormwater from the intense rainfalls.”
To Brown’s point, a classic example of heavy rain, historic flooding, and the City’s systems that couldn’t handle the massive volume of stormwater occurred on June 25-26 2021, when Detroiters witnessed six inches of rain – the most at one time in 80 years – turning freeways and streets into rivers, while tens of thousands of residential basements received unprecedented levels of water, in some cases mixed with sewage, measuring in feet, not inches. In essence, the substantial rain falling to the ground moved overwhelmingly faster than city sewers and pumps could handle.
Following Gov. Whitmer’s request, President Biden approved a disaster declaration allowing Detroiters and other state residents to apply for assistance through FEMA. Years before the 2021 floods, Detroiters had to grapple with numerous heavy rainfalls and severe flooding events.
Nevertheless, Brown said the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department has been busy cleaning out combined sewers that contain waste and stormwater to build more capacity to help mitigate basement floodings. He also said his department is making strides in upgrading the city’s sewer systems to address flooding issues due to heavy rain events through its Capital Improvement Program, a five-year, $500,000 plan.
“Since 2019, DWSD has invested close to $100 million annually through the Capital Improvement Program,” said Brown. “Its goal is to improve service delivery and quality of life in neighborhoods, including reducing street floodings, sewer system failures, and increasing acres managed by green stormwater infrastructure. And we don’t wait for that five-year program to end, every year we add another year to keep it current.”
The work is enormous when one considers that DWSD’s water system, according to its website, consists of more than 2,700 miles of water mains and a combined sewer collection system of close to 3,000 miles of sewer piping, and more than 90,000 catch basins. Over the last five years, DWSD has replaced more than 3,000 lead lines, the pipes that carry water into homes from the water main.
Helping to pay for the city’s systems’ upgrades are fundings from federal, state, and many other entities. Just over a year ago, Biden signed a $1.2 billion bipartisan infrastructure bill, $10 billion of which headed to Michigan, where $1.3 billion was targeted exclusively for water infrastructure initiatives. Gov. Whitmer’s plan to invest in the state’s water infrastructure was music to Detroit’s ears.
“I fully support Gov. Whitmer’s aggressive plan to invest in our state’s water infrastructure and appreciate her leadership on this issue in our city,” said Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan. “In Detroit, where we have the oldest infrastructure in the state, it gives us the ability to greatly expand our water main replacement program and replace an additional 2,000 lead service lines beyond our current program.”
“The federal government, through the Biden Administration, has provided $95 million just to replace lead service lines,” Brown added. “And in the city of Detroit, we have between eighty and one hundred thousand homes with lead service lines. If we can replace 10,000 a year for the next 10 years, we will be done.”
Other sources of funds positioned to help pay for replaced lead service lines and additional Detroit water and sewer upgrade projects include but are not limited to grants through the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE), the Building Resilient Infrastructure in Communities (BRIC), and the Flood Mitigation Assistance Program created to help cities rebuild water and sewer systems.
A key source for funding ongoing upgrades of the city’s water and sewer systems infrastructure is closer to home through the lease agreement between the City and the Great Lakes Water Authority (GLWA). The Agreement, reached in 2014, stipulates that GLWA will pay DWSD $50 million annually to invest in upgrading and maintaining Detroit’s water and sewer systems infrastructure for 40 years.
Brown also said the city’s Lifeline Plan, the income-based water affordability initiative developed by DWSD has significantly generated funds to help pay for water and sewer systems upgrades. He calls Lifeline a “win-win-win” situation, citing a win for DSWD’s customers, a win using dollars to help upgrade to systems, and a win to hire Detroiters.
“Our goal is to hire more Detroiters to perform the work needed to maintain and upgrade the water and sewer systems that their neighbors rely on every day,” said Brown, adding that 60% of DWSD’s workers are Detroit residents. “Detroiters pay the water and sewer rates. Why should Detroiters not benefit from these viable jobs and careers.”
Brown said through Detroit at Work and DWSD’s in-house training, Detroiters are prepared for many jobs associated with the department’s water and sewage upgrading duties. And, when bids are put out for contractors, DSWD makes sure at least 51% of workers working on city water and sewer projects are Detroiters.
For DWSD, the beat goes on in its mission to upgrade the city’s water and sewer systems while continuing to provide maintenance in key areas. In addition to upgrading the systems, DWSD has made innovative steps to combat flooding from massive rainfalls through “green stormwater infrastructure initiatives,” such as bioretention, rain gardens, and bioswales to reduce the amount of stormwater/snow melt entering the city’s combined sewer systems.
In the Brightmoor neighborhood on Detroit’s west side, DWSD is establishing 24 bioretention gardens aimed at curbing street flooding and basement backups during rain events. The bioretention gardens receive, absorb, and process runoff from rainfall or snowmelt from nearby streets before being discharged into sewers. There are approximately 20 green stormwater infrastructure projects throughout the city with more to be created.
Regardless of the methods used to upgrade Detroit’s water and sewage systems, they come with a price tag to replace, build, and/or maintain.
“We can’t pass this cost on to our customers in rates because it would make water unaffordable for the people struggling to pay now,” Brown said. “We need the continued support we are getting from both the federal and state levels, as well as other sources to pay for more robust and resilience systems, which include replacing lead service lines and enlarging our sewers so they can manage larger amounts of water.”
Is it possible that DSWD’s work to upgrade the water and sewage infrastructure will one day prevent flooding issues in totality?
“There are small sections of the city that are in flood zones, but the majority of the city is not,” Brown said. “In our Capital Improvement Plan, we are trying ‘to mitigate’ the flooding in those areas and throughout the city by making our water and sewerage systems more robust and resilient.”
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