Sewer Line Clean-Out and Maintenance in Progress

Hello Belvedere Park neighbors,

At approximately 11:30 AM on Monday morning, November 8, I was outside enjoying the beautiful fall weather. I happened to notice a man wearing a yellow jacket and a green safety helmet. He was carrying a large tool called slip joint pliers. I saw him walking into all of our neighbor’s front yards on San Juan Drive.

When he walked into my yard, he explained that he works for a private company that is cleaning out the sewer lines in our community for the DeKalb County Department of Watershed Management. He explained that it was necessary to remove the cap on the sewer line clean out port during their maintenance work. He stated that they would be applying pressure into the main sewer lines to help in the clean out process. By removing the cleanout cover on each house’s sewer line, then any excess pressure should be vented through the cleanout port before the pressure reaches the plumbing inside our home. If the cleanout caps were not removed on each home’s sewer line, then there is the potential for the pressure to force sewage into your home and out through your toilet, your tub, your kitchen sink, or any other plumbing that is connected to the DeKalb County sewer lines.

We wanted to alert all of our neighbors that a sewer maintenance worker is coming into each of our front yards, to give you a description of the man, to explain what he is doing, and to explain the reason that he is doing this.

Currently, they are doing work on San Juan Dr. We are told that they were doing work on Thomas Drive last week. Also, the maintenance crew said that it may take as long as 2 weeks for them to complete the sewer line clean out and maintenance throughout our community.

The name of the company that is doing the sewer line maintenance is Southeast Pipe (https://www.southeastpipe.com/). There should be approximately 3 trucks involved in this sewer line cleanout project. These trucks are: a DeKalb County Department of Watershed Management supervisor truck, a Southeast Pipe sewer line clean out and repair truck, and a Southeast Pipe camera truck that will run a camera through the sewer line to inspect for any damages or problems for the pipes.

The sewer line clean out cap that is in our front yard must be removed from the sewer line while they are conducting the main sewer line clean out. After they have completed the cleanout process on a section of the sewer line, then they will replace the sewer line cap in our front yards.

The maintenance crew stated that one of the substances that they are removing from the sewer lines is called FOG. This is an acronym for Fat, Oil, Grease. To get additional information on this problem, please go to this DeKalb County website link :

https://www.dekalbcountyga.gov/watershed-management/fog

After the sewer line has been cleaned out, then the camera crew will inspect the main sewer lines. If the camera crew identifies any damage to the main sewer line, then the sewer line clean out and maintenance truck will attempt to repair the problem.