ST. THOMAS – Je’Nelle Forbes sees social media as a last resort for solving problems. After nearly a year of appeals to government agencies about raw sewage seeping through her dividing wall and into her walkway, she finally turned to Facebook.
“I'm going more public than I have before as I hoped by now this issue would've either been resolved or at least made progress towards a resolution,” Forbes wrote in a Facebook post Monday evening.
Last October, Forbes returned home from vacation to discover raw sewage streaming through her neighbor's yard and seeping onto her property in Tutu Valley on St. Thomas. Forbes said she called her neighbor, who told her she was aware of the issue and had already reached out to the Virgin Islands Waste Management Authority.
The sewage directly affects at least three homes: Forbes’s, her adjacent neighbor’s yard that it flows through, and a home below where it pools.
Two months later, with sewage still coursing through the property and no solution from Waste Management, Forbes said her neighbor had someone visit the property to see if this was an issue that could be solved on her end. It wasn’t.
“So again, the communication went out to Waste Management to report the issue is still taking place," Forbes said.“It's continuously running. The flow is getting worse.”
After months without progress, Forbes said she began reaching out to other government entities including the Department of Planning and Natural Resources, the Department of Public Works, the Department of Health, Government House, and every single senator on both St. Thomas and St. Croix. Still, the sewage flowed.
Until Tuesday.
Less than 24 hours after bringing the issue to the island’s court of public opinion, a backhoe clawed its way through the Tutu Valley property to replace the compromised sewage pipes.
“What we have here is the sewage is flowing from up in the hills,” said Hannibal ‘Mike’ Ware, pointing to the hillside in front of Forbes’s property. "The box that was designed to hold the liquids as they're going down collapsed, and the pipes collapsed.”
Ware started as executive director of VIWMA on September 15. He said he was first made aware of the issue on his second day on the job.
“I was going to Office Max and a lady rolled down her window and said, “Mr. Wastewater, Mr. Waste Management, I need to speak to you,” Ware recalled. It was the owner of the property where the raw sewage pooled.
After hearing her plight, Ware went back to the office and made sure payment was made current to their vendor, which he said was finalized on September 26.
“This is all a part of new leadership coming in, leadership that's accustomed to getting things done and getting things done quickly,” Ware said. “My finish line is a lot closer than other people’s finish line, and that’s the way this place will be run."
Ware said that while the pipes were replaced Tuesday, the project won’t be fully completed until Saturday. In the meantime, Ware said they have temporarily rerouted the sewage, so it is no longer running through the property.
Forbes, who spoke with Ware Tuesday morning, said she’s cautiously optimistic.
“I feel confident, but still with skepticism,” she said. “I will believe it when I see it."
Forbes skepticism is more than justified. She has had to take extreme measures over the last year, working tirelessly to try and manage the constant presence and stench of sewage. She said there are days she can’t even use her front door because of the sewage overflow.
“My windows aren't airtight, there's going to be some flow of air that's going to seep through the little crevices. So, I put fabric softener dryer sheets as a means to filter that air from the stench coming outside,” Forbes said. “I have an air purifier that I run from time I get home till time I leave in the morning. And I also have diffusers throughout my home to at least have some type of fragrance to give my home a different scent other than sewage stench.”
While these problems should now be over for Forbes, Ware also made it clear that this was a temporary solution to a much larger problem, for which the solution is still years away.
“What we have is a crumbling wastewater infrastructure in our territory, either crumbling or crumbled," Ware said. “We know we have prudent replacement funds [FEMA funds] that will eventually take care of it. In the meantime, we're going to have issues like this that pop up.”
Ware said he has a plan to tackle these issues as they materialize, putting an end to stories like Forbes’s by bringing back the VIWMA hotline. He said he’ll have this up and running in the next two weeks.
“It'll be a way for me to personally be able to track the complaints of community members if something comes up, that I could make sure that it's addressed in a timely manner, not something that dies on the vine while one of my people in my community have to be dealing with this type of stench,” Ware said. “It is completely unacceptable and will not be happening as long as I'm executive director.”
