Bigfork Schools working to retain stormwater

By ALEX STRICKLAND / Bigfork Eagle

The children frolicking on the playground this fall won't know it, but buried beneath the soil is a state-of-the-art stormwater retention system, installed to help alleviate runoff from the school site to Grand Avenue and beyond.

"When stormwater control started to become an issue in Bigfork, we knew we needed to do something in the design," said Bigfork Schools Superintendent Russ Kinzer.

The system essentially employs a few drains that are hooked to a system of 10 3-foot diameter pipes buried in — and laying on — gravel. Water collected in the pipes after a big rain will then leech out slowly into the gravel and then into soil at a rate that will allow it to stay on the property instead of running off to Grand Avenue.

Kinzer said the system should be able to handle all but a "10-year rain event," acknowledging that those seem to happen about every other year now.

"This doesn't really retain stormwater," he said. "It detains it."

The special consideration for stormwater at the school struck a chord with Bigfork's relatively new Stormwater Committee, and Chairperson Sue Hanson said the extra effort was noticed and much appreciated.

"That's going to make a huge difference in what hits Grand Avenue," she said.

Hanson said that Kinzer and the school had kept the community in the loop on their efforts, a model that is needed, but not often followed.

"I really appreciated him (Kinzer) mentioning it to me," she said. "We don't want to have to go tearing things up that people spend lots of money on."

The committee is working with the engineering firm of Morrison-Maerle to complete a preliminary engineering report that outlines the existing infrastructure for stormwater in Bigfork and problem areas.

One of the areas most obvious to the committee was Grand Avenue, where stormwater runs unabated into the yards and homes of property owners on the low side of the street.

"This is going to have a huge impact," she said.

The schools also installed three drywells in what will be the parking lot near the high school to help combat stormwater runoff.