City could buy, demolish another home to fix flood problems

The city’s storm water division looks to add another piece in hopes of solving the puzzle of flooding in a central Columbia neighborhood.

The Columbia City Council will vote Monday on a $105,000 purchase of the home at 1104 Worley Street, across the road from the Columbia/Boone County Health Department, and another $50,000 to demolish and restore the land. The home, belonging to William and Nancy Justus, sits atop a sewer main and storm water system city staff can’t currently reach to facilitate any fixes to the decades-old flooding problem in the area, which includes sewage potentially mixing with rainwater and getting into people’s basements or the creek running through Again Street Park.

ABC 17 News covered the council vote to buy the home at 1105 Again Street in July, one block over from the Justus’ house, for the same purpose and at a similar price. The city already owns the lot at 1107 Again St., a purchase it made in 2003. With all three in place, city staff believes it can go through with the plan it put together in 1999, giving them “adequate working room” to line the sewer and storm water systems.

A full-fledged fix is scheduled for FY 2022. Until then, the Justus property would serve as an “overflow swale,” or a deep ditch to collect storm water.

A study done by Black & Veatch 16 years before that identified the area as a flooding problem, with dozens of homes affected by heavy rains running down into the County House Branch. Residents there came to the city council in 2015 to bring issues of sewer backups to their attention, spurred by rushing water flooding from their basement pumps into their homes.

Bill Justus has lived at 1104 Worley St. for 23 years. He tells ABC 17 News he came to the city after they bought Kathy Watson’s home on Again St. this year.

Watson told the council in July she hoped they would be “proactive” in getting another piece of property to fix the flooding issue. They knew it existed in 2003 when they bought her neighbor’s home, ten years before she moved to the area. Sewer manager David Sorrell said at that meeting they would need at least one other property to alleviate the problem, and got a message from Justus after the torrential rains of the July 4 weekend caused backups in several homes there.

The Justus’ place would also feature a bus shelter when demolished.