NEW ORLEANS — City Councilman Joe Giarrusso says a very few of the city's catch basins have been cleaned. He says after the weekend's rain event he wants to see many of the clogged catch basins cleaned out.
Councilman Giarrusso says there's 72,000 catch basins across the city, but less than 4,000 of them have been cleaned over the last two years. Now he's calling for the catch basins to be cleaned ASAP.
He said, "We know there is an x number of catch basins that haven't been cleaned but now seeing it and having video and showing people, these catch basins are clogged and they need to be addressed."
Filled with leaves and debris, a catch basin on Gibson Street in New Orleans is completely filled over. Catch basins are designed to catch runoff rainwater from the streets. Councilman Giarrusso is asking how that's supposed to happen if they're full.
"Just think about your bathtub everything can be perfect but if it is clogged it's not going to do and that's the same thing that is true with catch basins," he said.
Monday, the Sewerage and Water board of New Orleans said parts of the city flooded Saturday because we got a lot of rain in a short period of time, a power generating turbine shut down and the catch basins were full.
On Monday S&WB Executive Director Ghassan Korban said, "The pipes were so full and surcharged and the water could not make it through or some of the catch basins were not fully open allowing water to come through the system."
According to the councilman, there's 72,000 catch basins in the city. In 2022, 2,055 catch basins were cleaned. In 2023, 1,575 were cleaned.
"The power can be running all the way it's supposed to be, every pump can be on but if that front part of the system is blocked or substantially blocked then you're going to have trouble draining it as it's supposed to."
The City's Department of Public works is in charge of cleaning catch basins. In a statement Monday the city said in part, "DPW has been actively responding to Catch Basin Service Requests following a weekend flood event.... Over 300 catch basins and 15,000 linear feet of drain line have been cleared to ensure proper drainage during upcoming events."
Now, Councilman Giarrusso says funding has been allocated to clean the catch basins, he says it's just taken a really long time to get the contracts finalized.
WWL Louisiana reached out to the city again Wednesday and are waiting to hear back.
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