PALMETTO, Fla. — People who live in one Palmetto community say the heavy rain has sewage spilling over in the streets in front of their homes and they want it gone.

  • City says overflow is 80 percent rainwater, 20 percent sewage
  • Palmetto officials are allowing manholes to overflow; will treat water

As manholes are overflowing, the city's public works director say this is 80 percent rainwater and 20 percent sewage.

Allen Tusind says the water would normally go to the city's water treatment plant, but it is too full from all the rain.

So, the city is allowing the manholes to overflow and treat that water with lime before it dumps into a canal behind homes.

People who live in the area say they want answers.

"It affects your showers and the things you need to do every day. You know rinse and shower and dishes. All the stuff that goes with it. And it's a shame that this is part of, I guess it's part of growth. You need to manage growth," said resident Don Ross.

City officials say they are working on it.

"We're currently under contract for $6 million Equalization Basin, which is a basin that will help operate the plant better and also gives us about a million, million and a half gallons of storage capacity in these kind of events and we can take that access water and hold it in a tank and treat it at a later date instead of it getting out," said Tusind.

The city hopes to have that project completed in the next year. In the meantime, the city stated it is waiting on the rain to stop to clean the streets where the sewage spilled and test the water it dumped into.