More than a million gallons of human waste have been dumped into Dallas’ White Rock Lake over the past seven years by a neighboring town that used it as a sewage dump.
The untreated raw sewage came from Plano, a wealthy suburb north of Dallas, and it turns out this wasn’t the first time.
Plano’s sewage has entered Lake Texas 30 times in the past seven years, according to environmental data obtained by D magazine.
With such an abhorrent record, the city of Dallas is considering filing a lawsuit against Plano, best known as the home of posh soccer moms with $1,000 strollers and major corporate headquarters (Toyota Motor North America, JC Penney and Frito Lay [PepsiCo] to name a few.)
“Same sh**, different day,” Paula Blackmon, the Dallas City Council representative for White Rock Lake, told the magazine.
White Rock Lake, where more than a million gallons of untreated sewage has been dumped over the past seven years, is popular with the Dallas crowd in the summer
‘She [Plano] are aware that we [Dallas] are not happy and that they should stop. I called and spoke to Plano myself [Director of Policy and Government Relations] Andreas Fortuin. They need to get their stuff working.
‘B****ing and shouting from the highest mountain will not solve the problem. They need to fix their infrastructure.”
The Dallas official added that other discussions about the matter took place during the board meeting, but she could not speak about them publicly.
The last spill occurred on March 14 when a valve failed at a Plano water treatment plant Dallas Morning News.
It flooded the station and overflowed into a creek that flows into White Rock Lake, about 30 miles south.
Brown water flowed into the lake for 38 hours, with an estimated 500 liters of sewage flowing in per minute.
A wastewater treatment plant in Plano has repeatedly been the source of sewage leaks into a lake downstream in Dallas
White Rock Lake is a popular outdoor location in East Dallas, surrounded by multi-million dollar homes
When the water was tested on March 21, high levels of E. coli were still detected, although it was not clear how bad the contamination was.
Water sports and other recreational activities were suspended until a cleanup took place or chlorine tablets and clean waste were added to the lake to return the water to safe levels.
It is unclear whether the city of Plano was fined for this or previous sewer leaks.
In November 2021, more than 320,000 gallons of sewage flowed into the creek after a storm damaged a sewer line.
In June 2018, recreational activities at White Rock Lake were also suspended after 1 million gallons of fecal water escaped into the lake – due to a broken pipe in Plano.
In that case, the contractor who broke the pipe was fined $7,500, according to the local newspaper.
The city of Plano, for its part, claims it is replacing old sewer pipes and making improvements to facilities.
After sewage leaks into White Rock Lake, outdoor recreational activities have been suspended until water levels are safe