ATTLEBORO, MASS. (WHDH) - Attleboro officials are launching a public education program after the city’s pipes have been clogged and damaged by cleaning wipes.
Officials say the costly pipe and pump problems are the result of people flushing cleaning wipes down their toilets. This is an issue the city has had to deal with before but they say things have gotten worse since the start of the pandemic.
“We’ve had a real outbreak of it in the last couple of months,” Wastewater Superintendent Tom Hayes said. “Everybody is so conscience about sanitizing everything, they have this thing that looks like paper so let’s flush it down the toilet. The thing is you don’t dispose them that way.”
Hayes said the wipes can cause serious problems like sewage backups in neighborhoods.
“They’re blocking some pumps that will pump 2200 gallons a minute,” he explained.
Attleboro Mayor Paul Heroux said he considered banning the sale of those cleaning wipes but then decided against it.
“A lot of people are getting these wipes delivered to them from Amazon Prime and they’re getting delivered from all different places and people could just go over the border to Rhode Island,” Heroux said.
The cost of the pipe problems could exceed more than $10 thousand this year — a financial hit the mayor said customers of the Wastewater Department will be responsible for.
“It’s probably just a small group of folks that are still doing this and we’re hoping we’ll be able to reach everyone and let them know that this type of behavior… of disposing these wipes in the toilet is actually going to cost them money in the long run,” Heroux said.
The city can narrow down the problems to certain neighborhoods but not specific homes. The mayor said he is hoping that the public awareness campaign will help solve the issue.
“This is a big problem, its something people should take very seriously,” he said.
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