A federal judge has approved a modification to the long-standing consent decree governing how DeKalb County will fix its spill-plagued sewer system, giving it about seven additional years to complete more than a $1 billion worth of repairs.
U.S. District Court Judge Steven D. Grimberg approved the new arrangement — which also includes more extensive reporting requirements, steeper penalties for spills, and a $1.05 million fine against the county — during a Wednesday morning hearing conducted via Zoom.
“I find that it is fair, reasonable, in the public interest and consistent with the goals of the Clean Water Act,” the judge said.
Federal and state environmental regulators initially brought a lawsuit against DeKalb County in late 2010, saying its repeated sewer spills violated the Clean Water Act and other regulations. The parties entered a formal agreement on the path forward the following year.
For years, though, DeKalb County failed to make significant progress on the repairs to address its aging and long-neglected system, which creates ecological and public health dangers by spilling sewage into local waterways and spreading bacteria like E. coli.
And while current DeKalb CEO Michael Thurmond has made the system a priority since taking office in 2017, the county was nowhere near completing the requirements of the original consent decree when it expired in June 2020.
An extension was negotiated for more than a year. Federal prosecutors recommended last month that Grimberg approve it.
The modified agreement gives DeKalb until Dec. 20, 2027, to complete large-scale repairs in priority areas.
The county would also need to address a total of 103 repeat spill sites within the first four years of the new agreement, with at least half of them fixed in the first two years. Should any new problem sites pop up, with more than two overflows reported in a 12-month period, they would be added to the list.
“The modified consent decree holds DeKalb County’s feet to the fire to accomplish the work that needs to be done,” Peggy Eckrote, a lawyer representing the Georgia attorney general’s office and the state’s Environmental Protection Division, said during Wednesday’s hearing.
Byron Kirkpatrick, an attorney representing DeKalb, called the modification “the best path forward” for the county, its residents, the environment and the South River, the local waterway that has been most affected by the county’s ongoing sewer issues.
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Since the start of 2020, one trouble site near Lithonia alone has spilled at least 28.5 million gallons into the river. It was recently named named one of the country’s “most endangered” waterways by American Rivers, a Washington, D.C.-based conservation group.
The South River Watershed Alliance, a more local advocacy group, has been a longtime critic of how DeKalb County handles its sewer issues. It is also an official “intervenor” in the consent decree case — a third-party that has been given permission by the court to weigh in because it has a personal stake in the matter.
In a recent filing, the SRWA had requested that Judge Grimberg reject the modified consent decree proposal. Among other things, it balked at a section that allowed the county to approve new sewer connections using a “static” model that averages regular sewer flows to gauge the system’s ability to handle additional capacity.
It asked that an independent third-party be appointed to consider new connection requests until a more dynamic, real-time assessment model is put in place.
A representative from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said Wednesday, though, that those dynamic models had already been completed and were ready to be approved.
SRWA attorney Jon Schwartz then gave the modified consent decree his blessing.
During Wednesday’s hearing, attorneys representing the federal government also admitted that the original consent decree greatly underestimated the amount of work required to fix DeKalb’s sewer system.
The initial agreement focused on tackling fats, oils and greases that can cause clogs in pipes and create spills. But it’s since become apparent that a phenomenon called stormwater intrusion drives most of DeKalb’s issues.
During heavy rainfall events, stormwater enters through cracked pipes, manholes and other imperfections, overwhelming the system and forcing sewage back out of the same openings.
Fixing such issues — and more generally addressing capacity issues — is far more expensive, time-consuming and complicated than cleaning out pipes to address to remove built-up fats, oils and greases.
There’s a lot of work ahead, and Thurmond, the DeKalb County CEO, said he still doesn’t sleep well when it rains.
But he was ecstatic about the new path forward being approved.
“I’m just grateful to all the individuals at the federal, state and local level who contributed to the realization of this milestone,” Thurmond said.
THE STORY SO FAR
DeKalb County originally entered into a consent decree to fix its long-neglected sewer system and come into compliance with the federal Clean Water Act in 2011. While progress has been made in more recent years, previous mismanagement, infighting and corruption left the county well shy of the goals agreed to with environmental regulators when the initial timeline for repairs expired in June 2020.
A federal judge on Wednesday approved an extension that will give the county until Dec. 20, 2027, to make more than $1 billion worth of improvements. The new agreement also includes more stringent reporting requirements, intermittent deadlines and a $1.05 million fine.
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