BEAUMONT, Texas — Inches of raw sewage water flooded the clinic at the Humane Society of Southeast Texas after the city's drainage system couldn't keep up with Tuesday's rain.
It took hours for the staff to clean up the sewage water, according to the Humane Society's Shelter Director Taylor Westphal.
This isn't a new problem for them. They have been asking for help for months.
The nonprofit had already installed clean out plugs prior to the flood to drain excess rain water as an extra precaution. But those plugs and the city's drainage system were no match for all the rain.
"It was just a normal get to work kind of thing, and then unlock and well fare check, and that's when I noticed the clinic was definitely, definitely flooded," said Westphal.
The humane society was forced to act fast as the overwhelming smell of raw sewage water filled the clinic.
"We had 21 dogs that we were doing intake on yesterday, and I believe 17 or 18 felines. So it's not something that we can really cancel," Westphal said.
So employee's turned the adoption clinic's education room into a makeshift intake room. The staff came together to cleanup the entire clinic.
"Everybody who's not working in adoptions is gonna jump to the clinic. We're going to squeegee it out, we're gonna bleach, we're gonna disinfect, sanitize," he said.
The clinic does more than just intakes.
"It also serves as our quarantine facility as well, we do our spays and neuters for our in-house as well as low cost," Westphal told 12News.
The City of Beaumont's Water Director Mike Harris says there was an issue that resulted in a backup.
"Caused by the inflow into the, or infiltration of the rain water into our sewer system which caused the backup at the humane society," said Harris.
Plumbers, contractors and city inspectors checked out the damage.
"Do some control valve stuff. We talked about putting a back flow preceptor specifically for this, with an on ground drum, 400 gallon, sometime in the near future. So that way at least that'll stop here," Westphal said.
That's just a temporary fix though.
"The check valve closes and does not allow the water from the collection system to backup into the residence or business," Harris said.
Westphal thanks his entire staff for coming together to get things fixed. The city says this will be a long and expensive process to fix the drainage problems, but it is a priority.