The tranquility of Doherty Drive, Elletson Flats, St Andrew, belies the unsightly scene lurking in the backyard of the Lois Lindo household. Every time someone in the houses at Golding Circle, Mona, in the upper part of the area, uses their bathroom or performs another household activity that requires water, liquid waste flows downstream and relies on it. property.

“Every day, 24 hours a day, it’s a sewage system – that means every time someone takes a shower, washes their hands, uses the toilet, it comes out through my yard. Anything you can think of that goes on in a bathroom, that goes on in a house, comes here,” Lindo said to Jamaica Observer on Sunday during a visit to her headquarters.

The 61-year-old plant lover, who lives with her elderly mother, says the problem began in June after the National Water Commission (NWC) addressed a sewage problem affecting the Golding Circle housing development.

“They had a problem with the scheme and it was running on the main road. The NWC came and I don’t know what they did but they no longer have it in the scheme – now it’s in my yard. Their problem was dumped in my lap,” Lindo said in frustration.

According to Lindo, a connection to the sewer system – located in the hills above her house and which ran through her yard through a dormitory since childhood – became a terror because it was not maintained.

“Dad gave them permission to put (in) the system, give them a connection to the sewage plant in Elletson Flats, but they never maintained it. I remember when I was a kid, 12 years old, they built it and now I’m 61 years old and I haven’t seen them until this disaster,” she told Observer.

The household, which says it has been calling the NWC since June to report the problem, told the newspaper it had to take action last Friday to give itself temporary respite from the leaking sewer.

“I asked my gardener to dig a ditch (in the hillside) to stop the water coming down into the yard. If we don’t put the ditch in on Friday, we wouldn’t be able to stand here,” she said, pointing to the surrounding space.

“If you notice, the grass is two different colors (because) it started coming down there.

“I’ve been calling them since June. They come, fix it, clog again. All October I kept calling and calling and calling (but) no one is coming and I was frustrated. It stresses me out because between the ghouls and the mosquitoes it just ruins our lives, honestly. Out of desperation I had to dig the trench because the water was going everywhere,” she added.

Now she says it’s a waiting game to see if the NWC comes to her aid before the gallons of waste — which is kept at bay, though just barely — floods her yard.

“As you can hear, it’s still working. It was driving me crazy that the drain was starting to kill my plants. My dragons, all dead; all my little roses, dead. The system is old,” Lindo said.

In 2019, the NWC said the Elletson Flats wastewater treatment plant and another at Boscobel in St Mary were rebuilt at a cost of $620 million.

NWC is the main provider of wastewater or sewage services in Jamaica and collects wastewater from over 700,000 people across the island. The entity operates nearly 100 wastewater treatment plants throughout the island.

Central sewer systems are located in Kingston and St Andrew, southeast St Catherine (Portmore), Montego Bay in St James, Ocho Rios in St Ann and Negril in Westmoreland.

In addition, the NWC has responsibility for small sewerage systems that are associated with housing developments in various parts of the country.

Raw sewage from the Golding Circle community on Golding Avenue in Papine, St Andrew flows through these bushes into the backyard of Lois Lindo, who lives at Doherty Drive in Elletson Flats, St Andrew. (Photos: Garfield Robinson)