Ingham Co. aims to end decades of neighborhood's floods

VEVAY TWP. –Decades of flooding from a "woefully inadequate" drainage system built on swamp land south of Mason should be history by spring.

Residents of the Mud Creek subdivision in Vevay Township, and of nearby properties in the watershed, have been after Ingham County to do something about the flooding for years. Now, a $2.3 million project to replace or add more than a mile of drain infrastructure is set to start in June.

The residents, however, will face a 20-year special assessment that will cover more than half the cost, some $1.23 million. Taxpayers on the higher end will have to pay $10,000 and up.

"That's just the principal," Vevay Township Supervisor Jesse Ramey said. "You can double that, and that's what they'll be paying over 20 years."

He said 176 parcels are affected. Single-family homes occupy most of them.

Ingham County will cover 30 percent of the cost, and the township will pay 18 percent.

Just about everyone agrees that the whole mess shouldn't have happened.

Ingham Drain Commissioner Pat Lindemann said the neighborhood — bounded roughly by Dexter Trail, Chickasaw Drive and Ives and Tomlinson roads — was platted in the late 1960s and developed in the 1970s. A gravity drain system was created to carry water eastward to the Mud Creek.

About two-thirds of the land was swamp. Inspections and code enforcement weren't what they are now, but Lindemann speculates the developer, now dead for many years, didn't meet even standards of the day.

"The infrastructure that the developer put in was woefully inadequate," he said. "This is the sad part of it: People bought these houses thinking that everything was OK. And everything wasn't OK."

According to Ramey, there weren't a lot of inspections and the drains and basins weren't level. That led to a lot of flooding when it rained.

"Some houses have water that comes up to the bottom of the door, so it's very serious, he said. "Some sump pumps run all year long."

If the sump pumps fail, the Health Department will have to step in, said Robin Case Naeyaert, a Mason Republican who represents the affected area on the county Board of Commissioners.

"People won't be able to live in their homes," she said.

The residents finally petitioned the drain commissioner's office about four years ago. Several public hearings followed and a plan to solve the problem was developed after a design process that took nearly two years, Lindemann said. The $2.3 million also includes work, such as on roads, that are outside the neighborhood, he said.

Lake Odessa-based Jackson Dirt Works Inc. was hired as the contractor.

Lindemann described the project as especially challenging. Crews will have to work around roads, farms, fences and houses that have been in place for a quarter century or more. The work also has to be cost-effective "so we don't bankrupt everybody," he said.

The individual assessments — based on who benefits most and least — became official last week, Lindemann said. No one appealed.

He said the contractor is expected to have "substantial completion" by fall and final completion by spring, with the bulk of the work in July and August.