Willow Road residents need an ark

Sunday, August 19, 2007 10:37 PM CDT

No one had to tell Willow Road residents that the rain was heavy Saturday night.

"Probably 6:30, quarter to 7 (a.m.), it started coming in the house," said Michelle Jacobson, 25, who lives with her husband, Ryan DeGroot, 26, at 1843 Willow Road. Never has water come into the house in the six years they’ve been there, she said.

This particular stretch of Willow Road has always been subject to some flooding, several people said while they stood outside on Sunday afternoon watching the dimples of fresh rain falling on the sheet of muddy water. But it has never been this bad. One resident found a small catfish swimming in some of the water bubbling up along the western curb of the road.

"It’s never been this bad ever, ever, and we’ve been here like 16 years," said Jane Schultz, who lives at 1911 Willow Road. She pointed to the water which had almost surrounded her one-story house, swelling up from the small drainage ditch which separates her and her parents’ property from the house of Jacobson and DeGroot to the north.

Gregory Shaver Journal Times Water almost reaches the mail boxes along Willow Road Sunday after 4 inches of rain fell in the Racine area overnight. At least one home along Willow Road in Mount Pleasant ended up with water inside it.

Flood warnings

Area law enforcement agencies said there were reports of scattered flooding, and a meteorologist at the National Weather Service Office in Sullivan said the Fox River at New Munster and the Root River canal in Raymond were above flood stage. In Raymond the river was about a foot above flood stage and was expected to peak at 10.7 feet, 1.7 feet above flood stage, by midnight today and to sink below flood stage by Wednesday morning.

A flash flood watch was in effect overnight with weather officials expecting the heaviest rain to fall on areas already soaked by storms Saturday night.

At 8 a.m. Sunday the Racine Wastewater Treatment plant had recorded 4.1 inches of rain within the preceding 24 hours.

Struggling to stay dry

"We got two pumps going steady," said LeRoy Petersen, who had stopped by to help Schultz’s father, Wally. "We burned out one already — brand-new one."

Wally came back a few minutes later with a third pump, a spare just in case one of the other two quit. In his basement, part of which is finished off as a guest room with a bath, the water was seeping in at the sewer pipe along the north wall and flowing toward the sump pit, which was overflowing onto the floor while a pump hummed in the midst of the water.

Both Schultz and DeGroot pointed out that the flooding came as the village is trying to control the water by building a large dike and retaining pond across the road next to the Waxdale plant of SC Johnson.

"It’s not coming from Johnson Wax. I been here 39 years; it ain’t coming from there," Schultz said. The problem, he said, is that the nearby Pike River is backing up into the drainage ditch next to his land. Put a flood gate in there, he said, and his property would stay dry.

DeGroot waded into the house and raised valuable property, such as their computer, out of the reach of water, Jacobson said. There was about a foot and a half inside, and most of the dwelling was carpeted, she said. Their children went to stay with her parents.

They were planning to move and had bought a new home in Union Grove. The Willow Road house went on the market. "It was sold," Jacobson said, "but I’m guessing they’re not going to buy it now."

Story was written by David Steinkraus, Journal Times

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