School, county build drainage system

Except for longing to see a cloud or two, rain might be the furthest thing from people's minds in the middle of a hot Flathead summer.

But at the Bigfork School District this week, workers are preparing for the inevitable rainy season.

Thanks to a grant from the Montana Department of Environmental Quality, the district is installing a stormwater collection system. The retention system will collect rainwater that flows from the high school roof into the parking lot and allow it to leach slowly into the ground, so the water gets filtered before reaching the Swan River and Flathead Lake.

The project is expected to be finished in mid-August.

It's the district's second retention system; Bigfork installed one at the elementary school during renovations there last summer. Money for that project came from the elementary district's 2007 $5.5 million bond election, Superintendent Russ Kinzer said.

Most of the current project was paid by a $95,000 state grant. The balance of the $109,000 project came from money left over from the elementary bonds and deferred maintenance funds, Kinzer said. The district also paid for almost $12,000 in engineering services.

Bigfork schools got involved in the project in part because the district is a major contributor to the area's stormwater runoff, Kinzer said.

Rainwater collects on the high school roof and flows down the building's gutters into a storm drain in the parking lot. Most of the water flows into a catch basin across Grand Avenue - but the basin is only about 6 feet deep, Kinzer said.

"The people across the street from us started having trouble with stormwater coming into the basement," he said.

The school board directed Kinzer to figure out what the district could do about the problem. That's when Bigfork schools teamed up with Flathead County Commissioner Joe Brenneman and the Bigfork Stormwater Advisory Committee.

"The entire project is a real example of how different government entities can and should work together," Kinzer said.

Brenneman and Kinzer testified in Helena in January in support of the DEQ grant. Brenneman told the Inter Lake then that the district's retention system would address 80 percent of the runoff from about a 7-acre area.

Rather than working separately, the county and the school district drafted a memorandum of understanding that allowed them to work on the project jointly, Kinzer said. It was a more efficient - and more cost-effective - way to operate, he said.

In addition to installing the retention system, the project includes replacing the too-small collection basin across Grand Avenue, Kinzer said. The parking lot below the district office also will be expanded, he said.

Reporter Kristi Albertson may be reached at 758-4438 or by e-mail at kalbertson@dailyinterlake.com