EL PASO, Texas -- Work on the five central El Paso retention ponds will start in December. El Paso Stormwater officials blame the flooding problem on the freeway on the damaged ponds.

Wednesday morning the Public Service Board awarded a $555,750 contract to SAAB Site Contractors. Officials said work should be completed before next summer.

During the summertime Nathan Mitchell says he lives in fear. "Whenever it's overcast we start to worry, we're like, 'Oh, no,'" said Mitchell.

Anyone who lives on Elm Street in central El Paso will tell you it floods every time it rains. Mitchell had a small rock wall built over the curb to keep water from rushing toward his house.

"Before we had that we couldn't keep grass, or seed, or anything in the yard. It (the water) would wash away everything.

It's a problem El Paso Stormwater officials said goes beyond the flooding in this neighborhood. In central El Paso there are five retention ponds, and all of them have lost their shape and need major repairing.

"Because a lot of those ponds are over grown with vegetation and have a lot of silt in them, the water isn't able to sit in there as it should. The water instead travels down the streets and eventually ends up in the freeway," said Christina Montoya, spokeswoman for El Paso Stormwater.

During monsoon season, if it rains enough in one day Interstate 10 will flood near Piedras Street and the Texas Department of Transportation is forced to shut down the freeway. It's been known to create a traffic nightmare.

Officials hope reshaping and repairing the ponds will stop the flooding on the freeway and help neighbors like Mitchell.

"I think that the infrastructure is important to El Paso to maintain and update it for problems like these," said Mitchell.

The Kentucky Reservoir is located along Wheeling Avenue and Alabama Street; the Magnolia Resevoir is located Grant Avenue and Magnolia Street; the Altura Dam is along Altura Avenue and Scenic Drive; the Tremont Reservoir is along Tremont Avenue and Indiana Street; the Ohio Street Reservoir is located along Portland Avenue.