TULALIP, Wash. — Days of consistent rain led to a clogged culvert beneath a residential road that was overwhelmed on Friday by water in a neighborhood near Marysville. Because of this, the roadway collapsed entirely, leaving a gaping hole and 23 frustrated, stranded residents.
"We are basically landlocked," said Ellyn Ritchotte, who has lived in the neighborhood for decades. "They have livelihoods! They need to get to jobs.”
The collapsed 12th Avenue Northwest is the one and only road that leads to eight homes, according to Ritchotte.
Now residents, including young children and medically fragile people, are scaling the creek bed on foot to get to the other side – a dangerous feat, especially in slippery winter conditions.
The collapse of 12th Avenue Northwest is impacting the residents' access to mail delivery, trash pick-up and most importantly, emergency services.
"Emergency services are gonna have a tough time getting anybody out of here," said Steve Hall, HOA president for the area.
The culvert was built 50 years ago, according to Hall, and could not withstand the mounting water pressure from the flooding marsh.
"Between five and 10 million gallons of water was coming down through this hole," said Hall.
Additionally, cattail debris from nearby beaver dams caused the hole to get clogged when it was needed the most.
“This is ridiculous, and we need help. We need help," Ritchotte said.
Since the collapse on Friday, Ritchotte, Hall and other neighbors have been vocal in demanding urgent action. But the waterway is owned by the Tulalip Tribe, so private residents do not have the jurisdictional power to build anything new in the waterway.
"They do not want us touching it," said Ritchotte. "We can’t even trap a beaver, let alone take out a 40-foot, six-foot-diameter culvert.”
Hall said Tulalip tribe leaders need to expedite the permitting process to get work done on it. He's been on the phone with them, he said, for the past four days.
"Short-term solution, I think what I heard today: they made some breakthroughs. Possibly, that we're going to get somebody to come out just to put a temporary culvert in here and fill it back in," said Hall.
The Tulalip Tribes Board of Directors sent KING 5 a statement that read:
"The non-native residents are asking Tulalip to replace private infrastructure that is the homeowners’ responsibility, at the Tribe’s expense, and for the benefit of a handful of landowners... Tulalip will continue to work with the HOA to arrive at a quick and effective solution to this crisis because of the Tribe’s values."
The stranded residents are hoping that happens sooner rather than later, however, because they’re worried for their safety in having to keep climbing over the rubble.
In the meantime, Hall said he saw this coming.
"We knew it was failing. We knew it was old," said Hall, regarding the culvert.
For this reason, he was hoping the culvert would have been replaced by now.
"The Biden Administration, and infrastructure, all of a sudden they said they had money and funds and they were planning on replacing and fixing every culvert on this land and reservation. So they contact-- they contacted me. And we went through the process last year, and we got on the list, and I was waiting for us to get approved this year, this quarter. Still not there yet," he said.
He also shared what he is hoping for in the long term.
"We'd rather have a bridge put in here, so we don't have to worry about debris going through the culvert and clogging it up again," said Hall.
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