Out of the nearly 1,800 sanitary sewer line inspections conducted thus far for Albert Lea’s Inflow and Infiltration Sanitary Sewer Line Inspection Program, 61 have completely failed the inspection, City Engineer Steven Jahnke said Tuesday.

This means that between 3 and 4 percent of homes have failed the inspection — a percentage that is right along with the estimates the city’s engineering department made when the program was first introduced, he said.

“It seems like a small number, but that number can contribute a significant amount to our sewer system,” Jahnke said.

It only takes a few sanitary sewer lines with tile connections to overload the system, he said.

Under the Inflow and Infiltration Sanitary Sewer Line Inspection Program, all houses in the city built before 1975 — which totals more than 5,000 homes — must be checked for foundation drains that are connected to the sanitary sewer.

Plumbers conduct video inspections of each drain, and if a connection is found, it will be properly displaced.

It’s a plan that will prevent Albert Lea’s wastewater treatment plant from reaching full capacity and backing up into people’s homes during times of heavy rain.

“The program’s going very well, and the public has been very open to it,” Jahnke said.

Originally the department hoped to be one-third of the way through the inspections at this point, he said, but right now only about one-fourth of the inspections are done.

Local plumbers are conducting the inspections.

The cost of the initial inspections are paid for by the city. Then, if any additional work needs to be completed, homeowners will be given the option to pay the plumber outright or have the cost assessed to their property over a five-year period.

Out of the 1,776 inspections performed, there were 29 that were not able to be completed, Jahnke said.

Homeowners of about 1,300 homes have still not called to set up an initial inspection appointment, he said. He encouraged homeowners who have not done so to call a plumber and get one scheduled.

Because each plumbing business has its own schedule, he could not estimate how many months out the appointments would be. Scheduling it, he said, is the key.