Residents knee deep in flooding fiasco

May 28, 2011 at 12:00a.m.

Residents flooded the city administration building to discuss their water woes, after a weekend of storms that left some residents feet deep in water and sewage.

A storm water system built to contain extreme waters failed to alleviate the flooding of yards, basements and garages of dozens of Canfield residents as they were inundated with heavy, fast-falling rain Friday and Saturday.

About 20 of those residents came to city council Tuesday to voice their concerns about how well the storm water system actually works.

Mike Kubitza, of Fairview Drive, said his property has been flooded six times over the past eight years.

“I’ve installed a back-flow valve, an electric sump pump, and recently, a third pump,” he said. “I’m looking at thousands of dollars in damages from this last flood.”

Kathy Pavlansky, of Fairview, said her basement was filled Saturday with nearly a foot of sewage.

“I had to stand there and watch 3 inches of water turn into 9 inches of sewage,” she said. “It came up through my shower, my toilet and the drains.”

Joe Warino, Canfield city manager, said the system — a $5 million project built over five years beginning in 1998 — worked perfectly during Friday’s rains.

Warino said it was the 3 inches of rain over a 90-minute period Saturday that caused the already full pipes to back up.

“Saturday’s event came, and it was more than the storm system could handle,” he said. “Water was still in the pipes when the rains occurred on Saturday, and the system’s not designed for that.”