The Durham City Council is set to hear a presentation Thursday about the sewage capacity issues WRAL Investigates put in the spotlight last month.
As WRAL Investigates previously reported, the sewage system serving a portion of east Durham is at full capacity, thus halting new development in the affected area. WRAL Investigates spoke with several land owners whose projects were impacted, stalling hundreds of housing units. A fix is not anticipated until 2029 or 2030.
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The city has known of the sewage issue since at least December, as that is when the city first posted a "letter to industry" about the problem on its website. Yet it was not until WRAL Investigates started asking questions and bringing attention to the matter that the issue was added to a public meeting agenda.
On Thursday, City of Durham Water Management Director Donald Greeley is scheduled to deliver a presentation to the city council about the issue. The outline of that presentation is already posted on the city's website, offering some insight into what will be covered.
It states that two other sewage systems in the city are about five to 10 years away from reaching full capacity, and will need upgrades, too.
It estimates the cost of updating the system already at capacity at $30 million, and the others at $40 million and $25 million.
It also notes that, as WRAL Investigates has reported, some exceptions will be granted to allow development in the affected zone, even prior to a fix. The presentation states the city has heard from more than 20 impacted developers so far, and has been able to find a resolution on 12 projects.
In February, WRAL Investigates spoke with Durham City Manager Bo Ferguson about the issue, asking why the city did not catch the problem sooner.
"We implemented a new process to improve our modeling so that we could catch problems sooner," Ferguson said. "That new process identified this problem."
WRAL Investigates continues to hear from concerned residents, like Mimi Kessler, who questions why the city did not anticipate this situation.
"There are a number of us who have been following development for some time," she said. "I would regularly go to planning commission meetings and city council and ask about how many bathrooms there were going to be in this thing, and who was keeping track."
Kessler worries, too, that the rapid growth and development is straining not just sewage, but emergency services.
"I worry about the inability to address urgent medical needs," she said. "I also worry about fire."
Data from the U.S. Census Bureau estimates that the city of Durham has a population of 301,870 as of July 1, 2024. It's an increase from the 228,330 residents Durham had on April 1, 2010.
The presentation to the Durham City Council is scheduled to happen during the 1 p.m. Thursday work session. WRAL News will be following it to provide updates.
