Seymour Family Wants Relief From Flooding

John Boanno has a request for Seymour officials: Fix flooding problems on Walnut Street, or buy my house. 

Boanno, who lives at 25 Walnut Street, presented that proposal to the Board of Selectmen Tuesday (Sept. 6), three weeks after his wife fell into a large hole he said was created by erosion. 

Boanno said a waist-deep hole opened up next to a sidewalk in front of their home after flooding on Aug. 14. His wife fell into it and almost hit her head on the sidewalk, Boanno said. 

“My family’s life is at risk,” Boanno said. ​“I almost lost my wife that night.”

He told the Board of Selectmen Tuesday, during the public comment session at their meeting, that something needs to be done.

“Either fix the problem or buy the house and knock it down,” Boanno said in an interview after the meeting. 

The Problem

Boanno lives in the home with his wife, two children and his mother-in-law, Valerie McNeiece-Pollack. 

The home sits alongside the Steele Brook. The brook flows underneath Maple Street through a pipe, toward his home, Boanno said. 

Boanno’s family claims the pipe underneath the road is too small to accommodate the water flow from the brook. 

The result: Water from the Steele Brook pours out onto the street, into their yard and basement. 

McNeiece-Pollack, 70, also spoke at the Board of Selectmen meeting. 

She said she bought the home in 1963, at which time there wasn’t any flooding problem. 

The flooding began after 1980, McNeiece-Pollack said, with what she believes was extra runoff from the Silvermine Industrial Park.
 
As far as she knows, hers is the only house on Walnut Street that has a flooding problem from the Steele Brooke. Every time it rains there could be damage, she said.

What the town will do about the family’s predicament with Steele Brook remains to be seen. An email and several telephone calls to First Selectman Paul Roy seeking comment on the issue were not answered.
 
In the meantime, Boanno said he suffers nightmares and cannot get away from the erosion holes and musty, moldy odors that plague the house.
 
He is considering legal action.
 
​“A man has to protect his family,” he said.

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