Park City residents have been dealing water getting into their homes and flooding the basements and water overflowing the septic systems, putting raw sewage on the streets.
Watch Park City flooding story here:
“I would say that's probably coming out of the septic tanks up there,” Duane Reiland, Park City resident, said about raw sewage draining in his neighborhood.
Reiland contacted MTN on Tuesday.
He and his wife have been working around the clock since July 15, getting no more than about four hours sleep to keep up with the water seeping into their basement.
“We're doing this 24 hours a day,” Reiland said. “My wife and me taking turns, and sometimes we'll have some friends come over to help.”
It's a constant rotation for the Reilands of using a Shop-Vac to collect the water, and then the sump pump to move the water outside.
“Two sump pumps running down there and two wet, dry vacuums,” Reiland said.
Reiland says he has tried to get help from the Montana Department of Environmental Quality, the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation, and the Environmental Protection Agency.
“None of them want to come out and even take a look at it or do anything with this,” Reiland said. “We've tried the DEQ, the DNRC, the EPA.”
Stillwater County Commissioner Roger Webb says by Montana law, the ditch companies are required to clean the drainage ditches on the other end.
Reiland estimates the cleanup has not happened for 50 years.
MTN has not been able to contact the ditch companies for a comment.
“That water, you know, maybe that deep,” said Steve Lehman, describing about a half foot of water. “And now we're trying to dry it out, and we've got to clean it all up. We had to have him put a sump pump in to keep the water out of here.”
Lehman and his wife Linda live south of the interstate and had a plumber drill a hole in the floor and install a pump.
Reiland estimates about a dozen homes north of Interstate 90 have flooding problems.
And also in the south part of the city, at least five others have had to deal with water in their basements.
“They come in from the sides, and they come in through the floor,” said Mike Alexander. “And flooded all the bottom and we've been down here trying to get all the water out. ”
“Well, we trust the Lord,” said Linda Lehman. “He's in control, so we just let it go there and nothing we can do about it. ”
Webb may have more from the county sanitarium on Tuesday, and MTN will contact some of the agencies and the ditch companies.
