Darien 'Fared Rather Well' With Flooding

DARIEN, IL — Darien "fared rather well" with the flooding that resulted from heavy rainfall over the weekend, a city official said this week. Towns such as Elmhurst and La Grange were hard hit with flooding on streets and in basements.

"Things were backed up temporarily, but everything has receded," Dan Gombac, Darien's municipal services director, told the City Council on Monday. "Debris was left behind. Our crews were diligently doing general cleanup around inlets. I can't stress enough for residents to help us out with cleaning their inlets. We do currently have in place an adopt-a-storm-drain program as well."

Gombac also said his department visits residents' properties on request and analyzes what their storm drainage problems are and how they can be fixed. The residents are then provided with a list of vendors with competitive quotes, he said.

Among other things, Gombac said, a department employee walks around the perimeter of homes and looks to see whether gutter spouts are too close to houses. The city encourages residents to tie their gutters and sump pumps to the nearest storm inlets.

"They may have to go across certain yards. We are permitting that. There is a no-charge permit in place," Gombac said. "We are assisting residents to the best extent we can."

Alderman Tom Chlystek told the council that his Ward 4 had "bad flooding," but it receded after two or three hours.

"Good job to municipal services for going out and addressing areas that had flooded," he said.

Because of the economic effects of the pandemic, the city is not spending any money this year on its popular program to help residents financially with projects that benefit backyard drainage.