'Houses ... Smell Like Sewers,' Mayor Says in Plea for Federal Help : Floods of 2014

Volunteers from the New City Presbyterian Church helped Royal Oak residents during cleanup Wednesday. (Photo: City of Royal Oak Facebook page)

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The fetid mud and muck left behind by receding floodwaters may not be enough to qualify area residents for federal disaster assistance, even with the boost given to local communities with Gov. Rick Snyder’s southeast Michigan flood disaster declaration Wednesday.

Mayors across the tri-county area of Oakland, Wayne and Macomb also signed local disaster declarations in hopes of eventually triggering a Federal Emergency Management Administration designation that will bring a flood of financial relief to their communities. All across the region, torrential rains dumped up to 6 inches in some areas Monday, flooding streets, causing sewer backups in basements and stranding countless mortorists.

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Royal Oak City Manager Dan Johnson isn’t holding his breath. He told the Observer & Eccentric it’s doubtful local governments – let alone residents– will qualify.

“What (a state of emergency) does is make us eligible to take part in any federal disaster relief, if it ever comes,” Johnson said. “Most likely, it would only come to pay for repairs to damaged public property and clean-up costs the city has.”

Berkley City Manager Jane Bais-DiSessa concurred, calling the chances of federal help “slim.”

The mess is making life miserable for metro Detroit residents, many of whom are living in sewer-like conditions, Warren Mayor Jim Fouts told the Detroit Free Press.

“This is a public health issue,” he said. “A lot of people are living in houses that smell like sewer.”

The public health crisis extends beyond the conditions inside some homes that experienced sewer backups in the historic rainfall events. Scavengers are combing through the flood-damaged items and debris residents are piling on their curbs for disposal, and officials are worried where the items will eventually wind up.

In Royal Oak, heartache is piling up on the curbs as families part with water-logged keepsakes and other belongings, Judy Davids, the city’s community engagement specialist, told the Detroit Free Press after fielding phone calls and talking with residents about what they’re up against during a walking tour of neighborhoods.

“I hear in their voices the heartache and backache,” Davids said.

In some communities, more residences were damaged than came through the ordeal untouched. In Berkley, for example, nearly 60 percent of homes sustained flood damage. In neighboring Royal Oak, the figure was closer to 40 percent. In Wayne County, Dearborn, where a door-to-door assessment of damage is going on now, city officials estimated 40 percent of homes were damaged.

Officials in Warren, the hardest hit among Macomb County communities, estimate $1.2 billion in damages resulted when 18,0000 homes were flooded, The Detroit News reports. In a news release, Fouts said the damage there was “more widespread than anyone thought,” and none of the city’s neighborhoods escaped without some damage.

Royal Oak Mayor Jim Ellison called flooding resulting from Monday’s torrential rain “unprecedented,” and City Engineer Matt Callahan said the city’s sewer infrastructure functioned as it should, but the torrential downpour – what’s called a 100-year storm – taxed it beyond capacity. At one point, six-tenths of an inch fell in a 15-minute period.

“Our sewer system wasn’t designed to handle this much rain,” Callahan said.

“There was so much rain the system got full on its own,” Ellison said. “It ultimately did catch up with itself but unfortunately too late for people with basement damage.”

Related:

– How Copper Scrappers May Have Caused Freeway to Swallow Cars

– UPDATED: Snyder Declares Flood Emergency in Tri-County Area

– Dearborn Flood of 2014: Special Trash Pickup, Service Interruptions

– Wyandotte Flood of 2014: Free Residential Pickup for Flood-Damaged Items; How to File a Claim

– 40 Percent of Residents Report Some Flooding; Mayor Makes Disaster Declaration

– Flooding Affects Some Downriver Hospital Operations

– Oakland County Public Health Working with Restaurants on Flood Safety

- Record Rainfall Forces Michigan Residents Off the Road