Strong winds during a heavy rain may transport leaves, trash and other debris into street gutters, causing problems such as a drainage backup.

Velma Brewer, who lives on the corner of Green Street and First Avenue, said the four gutters and ditches bordering her house were so clogged by recent storms, she was forced to pay someone nearly $100 to manually come and clean them.

“It floods really bad around here,” Brewer said. “The flooding backs up debris to my house. For two days someone used a hand shovel to clean my gutters and once the grass and dirt was removed, gravel surfaced, which I didn’t know was there.”

Brewer said Selma Mayor George Evans came out Friday to see about the gutters, yet she’s still disappointed by the city’s lack of attention in fixing the problem.

“I and others try to keep our yards clean and cut. We keep our property up pretty good,” Brewer said.

Bill Jackson, garbage and trash supervisor, said all blame should not be placed on the public works department, which he said, are doing what they can.

“We have a crew that comes out every Wednesday through Sunday manually unclogging or using a truck vacuum to clean out gutters,” Jackson said. “A lot of times we can’t tell if gutters are backed up until after it rains heavily. If citizens would just clean up in front of their doors and in ditches and even bag their leaves after raking their yards, it would help tremendously.

“We’re doing the best we can do with what we’ve got,” Jackson said.