APPLETON, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – On July 5, a summer rain storm turned into a nightmare for families on Appleton’s north side.
“The storm and sanitary sewers couldn’t take it anymore. Grew up to about three to four feet in the street, and about noon, I heard a crack and the foundation of the house gave way to the pressure of the water, and we got about 80,000 gallons of water in our basement in about five minutes,” says Rachel Peterson, one of the many neighbors whose homes flooded.
Since that day, Peterson and many of her neighbors have been seeking damages — as they believe the flooding their homes sustained was ultimately caused by failing city infrastructure.
Appleton Mayor Jake Woodford has repeatedly said there were no blockages in the sewer systems that day, and that it’s no one’s fault but the rain.
Neighbors, however, aren’t backing down.
“We sent an open records request to the city of Appleton for info, primarily regarding the historical maintenance and upkeep of the storm and sanitary sewers, as well as what the city is doing to investigate the cause of the flood,” Peterson explains.
But they didn’t get any of that.
“What they replied with only satisfied a fraction of the requests. So the city’s response to our open records request, frankly, was unresponsive and inappropriate,” Peterson adds.
The city failed to provide any information about the sewers before 2024.
“We learned about the city’s future plans, which does not include work to the storm and sanitary sewers for our neighborhood,” she says. “We learned the scope of their investigation only covered looking into the amount of rain that fell that day and not the storm or sanitary sewers, and that’s about it.”
Peterson says the city failed to provide documents they believe would favor them.
“We know that there have been constituents in our neighborhood that have had issues in the past with flooding and high rainwater. They’ve expressed those issues to the city and the city has come back in a couple of ways and said the systems that are in place are inadequate and there are not plans as of right now to make those systems adequate,” Peterson says.
FOX 11 reached out to Mayor Woodford about the records request response, but we did not receive a reply.
Last month, the city launched local resources for those impacted, after announcing that no local or federal government aid is available to support those impacted homes.
“The other thing that makes this so difficult is while the city is reaching out to external sources to provide help, they recommended we call the 211 hotline, and many of our neighbors did call the 211 hotline with little to no help. We got a letter back that there were grants available to do work if it had already been done. It’s a month later, and we’re not going to be sitting with seven feet of water in our basement for a month. That’s very frustrating,” Peterson adds. “The theme that we have been seeing over the last six to eight weeks is too little too late.”
Appleton Alderman Chris Croatt tells FOX 11 he provided all his correspondence regarding the flooding in the records request, including emails and text messages — adding that he can’t speak to what the city provided.
He says he wishes there was more he could do to help, but after the threat of legal action, his communication with neighbors had to stop.
Peterson says another records request has been submitted, seeking the information they didn’t originally receive and several clarifications from the city.
As of now, no class action lawsuit has been filed by Peterson or their neighbors, but she says it could still be a possibility down the line.
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