Village to Start Investigating Illegal Downspouts

Whitefish Bay will start looking for homes that have downspouts connected directly into the ground in an effort to eliminate the amount of rain water in the sanitary sewer system.

By walking down the sidewalk and scoping out downspouts, village employees will start identifying homes that are illegally routing their downspouts directly into the ground, which may mean they are sending the clear water into the sanitary sewer system designed to treat wastewater – not rain water.

Once these homes are identified, the village will send letters to homeowners asking for permission to conduct dye water testing to determine if the clear water is indeed headed into the sanitary sewer.

And if a homeowner doesn't give the village permission to do the testing?

Staffers plan to check with the village attorney on how to proceed with getting permission to step onto the property and investigate, which may require a warrant.

The village has determined that as many as 15 percent of homes may have illegal downspouts, based on a survey that engineering consultants Donohue and Associates conducted last year.

The net effect of the illegal downspouts is the equivalent to about 25 acres of impervious surface water in the village, which is enough to overflow the capacity of the sanitary sewer system with just a five-year rain event, according to Donohue engineer Steve Sticklen.

Out of 220 homes served by an 8-inch sanitary sewer, Village Engineer Dan Naze said it only takes 10 to 12 homes with illegal connections to overwhelm that sewer.

"There is a potential that we have downspouts in the village that are connected directly to the sanitary sewer," Naze said. "If a downspout goes into the ground, the only other pipe it could be connected to besides the storm sewer is the sanitary sewer. That can be a source of a large volume of clear water going very quickly into the system."

A village committee on Wednesday authorized staff to move forward with the inspection process.

The current village code requires a plumbing permit to disconnect a downspout, so several committee members said the code should be streamlined to allow these homeowners to take remedial action as soon as possible.

"There's no way in the world we're going to ask homeowners to care of this, and then tell them 'By the way, you have to pay 75 bones for a permit,'" Trustee Kevin Buckley said.