Several Arlington city council members want the city to do something about residents\u2019 backyards being washed away by creeks.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Multiple experts previously told KERA the city could face a crisis with erosion and flooding<\/a> if issues with stormwater runoff and creek erosion aren\u2019t addressed quickly.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Arlington has 140 miles of creeks and streams,\u00a0according to\u00a0Assistant Director of Public Works Amy Cannon. That number is up from August<\/a>, when the city estimated 112 miles of natural waterways. \u00a0<\/p>\n According to a presentation Cannon shared with the council Tuesday, only 28 of those 140 miles are classified by the city as \u201cstable.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Around 23 miles of the creeks are classified by the city as \u201chighly unstable,\u201d with a price tag to fix them sitting around $534 million, according to Cannon\u2019s presentation. Another 61 miles classified as \u201cmoderately unstable\u201d would cost about $548 million to stabilize while 28 miles of \u201cmoderately stable\u201d creek banks would come with a bill for $74 million.\u00a0<\/p>\n Mauricio Galante<\/a>, who represents District 1 on city council, said he\u2019s\u00a0seen an increase in emails from residents concerned about erosion.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI myself visited more than a dozen locations where people are losing their backyard,\u201d Galante said.<\/p>\n He said some residents are losing swimming pools and several face threats to their house\u2019s foundation because of erosion.<\/p>\n He wants the city to find a way to help residents cover the costs of preventing more damage and possibly helping to reverse the harm erosion has already done.\u00a0<\/p>\n An expensive\u00a0proposition\u00a0<\/p>\n According to Cannon, it would cost the city around $1.16 billion to stabilize all the creeks in the city. \u00a0<\/p>\n The city\u2019s current utility fee structure, $10 a month for residential property and fees based on the amount of impervious land for commercial, provides around $20 million a year, Cannon said. But that money is typically devoted to flood mitigation, not erosion.\u00a0<\/p>\n Much of that creek system cuts through backyards and private business property. In August, the city said only\u00a043 miles of the creeks are on public land. \u00a0<\/p>\n Those 43 miles are what the city is responsible for maintaining,\u00a0Cannon said. The rest is up to property owners.\u00a0<\/p>\n That means homeowners are responsible for all the costs associated with repairing damage and mitigating the risk of future erosion.\u00a0<\/p>\n But residents told KERA the quotes for even a simple retaining wall can run into the hundreds of thousands\u00a0\u2014 sometimes as expensive as the home itself.\u00a0<\/p>\n District 2 Council member Raul Gonzalez echoed Galante in that he\u2019s\u00a0seen more residents reach out recently with erosion concerns.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m really shocked at how many emails we\u2019ve gotten regarding, you know, trying to help Arlington families with the erosion issues,\u201d Gonzalez said.\u00a0<\/p>\n He said some cases are a result of residents or Homeowners Associations (HOAs) neglecting their responsibility to maintain\u00a0creeks through their own erosion mitigation and lakes in the neighborhood by dredging them.\u00a0<\/p>\n Residents in the Prestonwood West neighborhood experienced something like that in 2018, when Prestonwood Lake became too filled with sediment brought from upstream. The city broke the dam, which created a lake out of the creek that runs through some backyards, to get rid of the flooding.\u00a0<\/p>\n Residents said they weren\u2019t aware it was their responsibility to dredge the lake and that breaching the dam not only removed a water feature from their neighborhood but also led to fast-flowing water in the creek practically dissolving their backyards.\u00a0<\/p>\n Gonzalez\u00a0noted it may \u201ccost each home $100,000\u201d in an HOA to dredge a lake like Prestonwood Lake, but that the city can\u2019t get pay the bill for them because the lakes aren\u2019t publicly accessible and don\u2019t\u00a0benefit the city as a whole.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI hate to say it\u00a0but\u00a0it\u2019s not my problem\u00a0if you don\u2019t want to pay for it,\u201d Gonzalez said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Experts said the two issues are interconnected.\u00a0<\/p>\n Adnan Rajib<\/a>, who lives in South Arlington and is an engineer, hydrologist and director of the Hydrology & Hydroinformatics Innovation Lab at UT Arlington,\u00a0previously told KERA News erosion and flooding are interconnected.\u00a0<\/p>\n Soil carried off from creek banks has to end up somewhere. That erosion becomes sediment, and when it\u2019s deposited somewhere else it can build up and reduce the depth of a creek bed, pond or lake.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a cascading effect, both in our drinking water, recreational water sources, as well as flooding,\u201d Rajib said.\u00a0<\/p>\n When soil is eroded upstream and deposited in a lake or portions of the creek downstream, it increases pushes more water into other parts of the stream. The increase in speed and volume speeds up that erosion process.\u00a0<\/p>\n Residents argue that lake dredging should become the city\u2019s problem when it impacts\u00a0those without responsibilities, or even rights, to maintain waterways and lakes on someone else\u2019s property.\u00a0<\/p>\n What other cities do<\/p>\n