Test smokes out improper connections to Cedar Rapids sewer system

CEDAR RAPIDS - Smoke on Tuesday morning was spewing out of sewer manholes on quiet Nilson Road NE and out of vent stacks on the roofs of homes there just like it should have.

None of the non-toxic smoke came out of the wrong places - from around foundations, out of roof gutters, in front yards.

'It's all good,” said Kevin Jacobson, owner of Central Iowa Televising, a McCallsburg, Iowa, firm conducting the smoke test to identify problems in the city's sanitary sewer system on contract with the city of Cedar Rapids.

The smoke test at 9 a.m. Tuesday was the first of a week's worth of such tests in a study area of about 500 homes in northeast Cedar Rapids. The city is working there to identify which houses have sump pumps, foundation drains and downspouts connected directly to the city's sanitary sewer system in violation of a 30-plus-year-old city ordinance.

Any smoke coming up in the residential yards would indicate breaks in the sanitary sewer lines running from the home to the street, which are the property owner's responsibility.

Megan Murphy, the city Utilities Department communications coordinator, said Tuesday that the study's intent is to identify 'infiltration and inflow” or I & I of groundwater and rain water that should go to the city's storm sewer system, not the separate sanitary sewer system.

The I & I can help to overwhelm the sanitary sewer system in times of heavy rain and flash flooding, which can send the mix of water and sewage backing up into basements in the city, Murphy said.

Just such basement backups occurred in 122 reported cases in the city on the night of June 29 and morning of June 30 this summer.

The pilot study was approved months before the June heavy rain as the city has been looking to establish a policy and perhaps provide some incentives to get the illegal connections to the sanitary sewer system changed.

It is an issue the city has talked about for some years, but has put off.

As part of the current study, city representatives in recent weeks have gone door to door in the study area - in the area from Old Marion Road NE and First Avenue East to 32nd Street NE and 40th Street NE - to inspect homes to see which had improper connections to the sanitary sewer system. The smoke test is designed to help with that effort.

Dave Wallace, the city's sewer utility engineering manager, said Tuesday that a preliminary estimate is that about 25 percent of the 500 homes in the study area need to make changes in connections for sump pumps and foundation drains.

Wallace has said that federal housing guidelines some years ago directed builders to connect foundation drains to the sanitary sewer system in an effort to keep basements dry. As a result, some homes of a certain age in the city have such connections in place. Even so, they are not permitted by the city's current law.

Murphy said some newer homes in the city also have made improper connections to the sanitary sewer system not realizing that it is not allowed.

Wallace said the city's Public Works Department will be making recommendations to the City Council to see if the council wants to implement a program to remove the improper connections.

Murphy thought that recommendation would come in the spring.

The city already has a program in place to provide a $500 incentive to disconnect a foundation drain from the sanitary sewer system. But only one person has taken advantage of the program to date.