County taking emergency action to expedite repairs at sewage treatment plant

Cleanup at sewage treatment plant

SEATTLE — On Monday,  King County will take emergency action to expedite cleaning and repairs at Seattle's crippled West Point treatment plant.

Officials say something needs to be done now to fix what they are calling "catastrophic damage."’

The urgency has to do with not wanting to wait until another major storm hits, and with rain coming down, county officials don't want to take any chance.

Over the weekend, we talked to Jeanne Kohls Welles who sponsored this measure.

She wants to see this water treatment plant back to 100 percent as soon as possible.

It's been running at partial capacity since storm water runoff destroyed hundreds of pumps and electrical panels.

That, in turn, dumped millions of gallons of raw sewage into the Puget Sound

The big question is how much the expedited repair is going to cost.

A vote on the measure is expected at 1:30 p.m.