DETROIT – Water has been spilling over sea walls and causing a huge mess in Detroit's Jefferson Chalmers neighborhood.
At a quick glance, Matt Jones' backyard looks like a pond that is growing into a lake and he said there's nothing he can do about it.
"The reason why it's frustrating is because I put all of this work in beforehand to get ahead," Jones said.
All of that hard work and preparation has gone down the drain because the canal behind his home conquered his sea wall and the water is covering his backyard. And as if that's not enough, he said the city of Detroit is blaming him.
"How is this the residents' fault? We don't control the water," Jones said. "We're all being ticketed, basically saying that, 'This is your fault' the water is coming into the city and the streets," Jones said.
Jones showed Local 4 documents from the city demanding he fix his sea wall or else.
"It's dated five seven (May 7), they said it needed to be done by five ten (May 10). In order to book to get anything done on the water, you have to know about it and schedule it in March or April. Now they have jobs for the year already," Jones said.
The mayor's office released the following statement:
"We only issue violations to property owners whose seawall was allowing water to come through and added to the neighborhood flooding. If any violations were written in error to adjacent property owners whose flooding may have been a result of a neighbor's seawall and not their own, we'd like to know about it so we can address the mistake."