Portage County Water Treatment And Flooding

Anchor Intro: It’s a little over a month since the Toledo water ban, could the same thing happen in Portage County? And could local flooding issues be lessened in the near future? TV2 reporter Brian Ivey found out some answers.

Flooding is an issue across many communities and that holds true across Summit and Portage counties. Some city leaders from the local area are going to try and lessen flooding issues by coming up with a watershed mapping plan in order to see where the flooding issues are.

Anthony Zumbo from the Portage County engineers office  doesn’t see many big changes coming from this project.

“Two hundred to three hundred property owners would be affected for large-scale flood mitigation when only about five of them are experiencing flooding,” Zumbo said.

Just a little over a month ago was when the Toledo water crisis took place. Toxins caused by a large algae bloom in the shallow western section of Lake Erie forced a water ban to take place.  The contaminated drinking water would have potentially caused flu-like symptoms.

Farm runoff with large amounts of fertilizer are a major contributor. The shallow warm water and fertilizer create perfect conditions for the algae to grow in Lake Erie.

Do local cities like Kent and Ravenna have to worry about a similar situation to what happened in Toledo? Watch the video to find out.

Outro tag: Kent’s water was named the “Best Tasting Municipality Water” back in 1995 and has placed in the top five since.