Growth spoils lakes; neighbors foot the bill

Raleigh negotiating upgrades to a dam and spillway

RALEIGH -- Stormwater runoff from a shopping center, new homes and a wider road has pushed dirt and sludge into the three lakes at Greystone Village. But the neighborhood has been stuck with the bill.

Homeowners in the 830-home Greystone, off Sawmill Road in North Raleigh, have paid more than $160,000 to maintain the lakes, including pulling out the muck that has run off from upstream development during storms. An additional $23,000 has been spent to repair washed out bridges and roads.

"It's just been the collection of all of the runoff from all of the construction for the past 17 years or so," said Nancy McFarlane, Greystone association president. "I don't think, when the lakes were built as part of this neighborhood, they were really meant to handle all the runoff from this construction."

The neighborhood is getting some help from the city. Officials are negotiating a contract to design an upgrade to the dam and spillway at the largest lake, Greystone Lake, and possibly to dredge the lake, said Danny Bowden, the city's stormwater program manager.

The project stems in part from a new city policy of negotiating with property owners to preserve existing lakes.

As part of the policy, which city planners are considering for inclusion in the city's Comprehensive Plan, officials evaluated more than 100 lakes to determine where improvements were needed.

For the city, the neighborhood lakes are performing a valuable public function: capturing stormwater and helping to filter out pollutants, Bowden said.

"It's obviously more cost effective to upgrade an existing lake than to build a new lake," Bowden said.

Risks from floods

Dozens of small lakes and ponds dot Raleigh's neighborhoods. Some are old farm ponds, remnants of the land's past. Others were built as amenities for neighborhoods -- a place to fish, boat or swim.

Many are covered with algae or weeds or are filled deep with sludge from stormwater runoff. They can be expensive messes for neighborhoods to clean up and dangerous if they aren't properly maintained. Some can flood after heavy rains, muddying yards, washing away landscaping, or, worse, leaking into crawl spaces and threatening homes.

In the past, Raleigh has had little money to help neighborhoods with their lakes, though many of the problems were caused by growth and development that city officials approved.

In Greystone, homes, some with views of the lakes, sit on tree-filled yards. Residents walk their dogs on a path around Greystone Lake and fish or boat there.

More stormwater rushed to their lakes after the construction of the Harvest Plaza shopping center in the mid-1990s, Traemoor subdivision about five years later and the widening of Strickland Road a few years ago.

The city's ranking found that there is a high risk of serious structure damage, and even death, if repairs aren't made to the dam. A heavy rain or hurricane could flood some homes.

Nearly three dozen other lakes in the city have a similar rating, including the city-owned Lake Johnson in southwest Raleigh and the privately owned Northshore and Brentwood Today lakes in northeast Raleigh. Bowden said the highest risk is for loss or damage to property.

"We have some homes that the water comes pretty close," McFarlane said of Greystone Lake.

City's help

The city hasn't had the money to make upgrades, but that has changed.

The city's stormwater utility fee, which started in 2004, created a dedicated pot of money for stormwater projects.

The fee, which property owners pay based on the square footage of their roofs, driveways and other so-called impervious surfaces, is expected to raise more than $12 million this fiscal year.

Ron Franzel, who lives near a lake in the Brentwood Today neighborhood near Capital Boulevard, is glad there is some money. The city is negotiating a contract with engineers to make improvements to the Brentwood Today and Northshore lakes.

The dams at both lakes are in poor condition. At Brentwood Today, heavy rains have washed away much of the 150-foot spillway. It now is just 20 feet, Franzel said.

Ultimately, he said, he would like the city to take over the lake, which a City Council committee is considering.

The city benefits from the lake and should pay for it, he said.

"I just feel that it's a stormwater problem," he said. "We can't handle all this stormwater. We can't be the fall guy for all the stormwater that comes down here. It's a community problem, and it has to be solved by the community."