Cobb County Sewer and Drain Service: Local Rules

Georgia Sewer clears, inspects and repairs the private side of sewer and water lines for homes served by Cobb County Water System in Cobb County. When the trouble is in the county's service lateral, the public main or a county line inside a recorded easement on your lot, the Water System handles it, and we tell you when that is the call to make.

Cobb County Water System (CCWS) serves about 160,000 sewer customers across the county and treats their wastewater at four water reclamation facilities (CCWS). Not every Cobb address is on its sewer, though. Marietta, Smyrna and Austell run city systems in at least part of their territory (see the Marietta, Smyrna and Austell pages), so the utility named on your bill decides which rules apply to your line.

CCWS owns and maintains more than 2,600 miles of sewer collection mains, from 8 to 72 inches across, plus 46 miles of force mains, and some parts of the collection system have been in service for more than 80 years. Crews inspect the pipes with closed-circuit TV cameras and schedule rehabilitation where they find broken pipes, offset joints, roots or bad service connections (CCWS maintenance).

If your water and sewer bill comes from Cobb County Water System, the rules below apply; if it comes from a city utility, see that city's page instead. Not sure whether your address is inside a city at all? Cobb's residential permitting page links a county map that shows the jurisdiction for any address (Cobb County). The table at the end lists the cities and communities in this directory where CCWS provides sewer, with a note on how each is served.

In unincorporated Cobb, the county's Community Development Agency issues permits and enforces the building codes (Cobb County). Cities issue their own permits; the table below names the office for each place.

Cobb has a specific procedure for a new or replacement sewer line on private property. The plumbing permit must be marked for sewer installation by a state-licensed master plumber, and the line is approved either with a notarized sewer approval affidavit or by a county inspector looking at the pipe before it is covered. If the plumber chooses the visual inspection, the trench must stay shored or sloped under OSHA rules and Cobb's trenching ordinance for as long as it is open (Cobb sewer approval form).

Homeowners can pull a county permit only for work they do themselves on the home they live in. When a contractor does the work, the contractor must apply (Cobb County). If the job needs a permit, we tell you before work starts.

Before anyone digs, Georgia 811 asks for a free locate request at least three business days ahead, and state law requires one before digging with mechanized equipment (Georgia 811; Georgia dig law). The same law has the sewer utility help locate a lateral only up to the edge of the public right-of-way, so finding the rest of your line falls to the owner. Our technician starts at your cleanout and runs a camera through the line before any digging.

Grease causes most of the county's sewer blockages: CCWS says 85 percent of Cobb's sewer blockages are grease-related and happen in residential areas, and it asks residents to let grease harden and scrape it into the trash, wipe pans before washing, and use sink strainers (CCWS FOG). It also names wipes: most residential overflows and blockages come from grease and "flushable" wipes, and only toilet paper and human waste should be flushed (CCWS report forms).

Rainwater has to stay out of the sewer. Cobb's code bars connecting roof drainage, basement drainage, groundwater, or subsurface or yard drainage to the wastewater system unless no storm sewer or other reasonable alternative exists and a discharge permit allows it (Cobb Code § 122-181(a)(15)). Everyone using the county system must also keep infiltration and inflow down, including by using watertight pipe in the private parts of the sewer (§ 122-153(f)). For a fuller list of what to keep out of drains, see what not to flush or pour.

Septic systems are still allowed in parts of Cobb. County code permits septic tanks on residential lots of at least 80,000 square feet when other code conditions are met, and a home that used septic before sewer reached it may stay on septic as long as the system works properly. For a single-family home, sewer counts as available when the main floor can drain by gravity to a sewer in a public right-of-way or easement that borders, touches or crosses the lot (§ 122-153(b)).

Georgia's Department of Public Health sends septic record requests, inspections and other local questions to the county environmental health office (Georgia DPH). In Cobb that is the environmental health division of Cobb & Douglas Public Health, which lists state-certified septic pumpers and installers and points out that a septic system, unlike public sewer, must be maintained by the property owner (Cobb & Douglas Public Health). On a septic lot, Cobb's permit checklists for additions, renovations and similar projects ask for an environmental health approval stamp (Cobb County). If you aren't sure which system you have, see septic or sewer: how to tell.

On the owner's side of the line, our technicians handle drain cleaning and main sewer line cleaning for backups, hydro jetting for the grease buildup behind most of Cobb's blockages, sewer camera inspection to find where a problem sits, and sewer line repair and replacement of the private service line. We also have city pages for Mableton, Kennesaw, Acworth, Powder Springs and Vinings. To book a visit, call Georgia Sewer at (404) 482-2527 or request service.