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Three-year-old sinkhole expedited after review of case
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BATON ROUGE — A sinkhole in Broadmoor has been an annoyance for one man for three years. Harley Brown lives on Elizabeth Street and says a child fell into the hole in his front yard on Halloween night in 2021.
"Three years ago, 2021, a kid steps in this hole and ends up to his waist," Brown said.
He called the city and they responded immediately to secure the area with orange plastic fencing and wooden posts. Several months ago, Brown called the city again after the plastic fencing needed to be replaced.
"Other than put an orange fence around it, they've done nothing," Brown said.
He's called the city to get an update but hasn't received a return call. When another Halloween came and went and Brown's sinkhole still hadn't been repaired, he sent an email to the city and looped in 2 On Your Side.
The response from the city mentions a backlog in drainage sinkhole repairs and a contractor working with American Rescue Plan funds secured by Mayor Broome. Up until that email, the city admitted that Brown's sinkhole was not on a list to get repaired.
"They said we don't even have a work order for you!" he said.
After the email, Brown was told his sinkhole would be repaired in the first quarter of 2025, but after further review and learning a child fell into the hole the city is now expediting the request and plans to make repairs by the end of next week.
The city has been using ARP funds to fix City-Parish sinkholes since February 2022. The 1,100 sinking repair campaign was originally scheduled to wrap at the end of 2023, but it will continue into the first few months of 2025. All but 66 of the sinkholes on that list have been repaired.
Since January 2022, the city has received 2,115 sinkhole repair requests and of those 791 repairs are outstanding. The city will use a combination of federal funding from the American Rescue Plan and City-Parish general funds to continue making repairs. There is an item on the next Metro Council agenda to reallocate an additional $708,000 in ARP funds for these drainage repairs.
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