The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Jonathon Naylor Editor Flin Flonners should be drinking safer tap water by the spring of 2012. That's when the city hopes to commission its multimillion-dollar water treatment plant, whose construction is set to start this spring. "Basically as soon as the weather permits," said Director of Works and Operations Rick Bacon when asked when construction will begin. The city, province and feds are splitting the cost of the $13.2-million plant, which will go up near Ross Creek adjacent to the Aqua Centre. Bacon expects the project to be tendered in mid-February once the city's consulting firm completes the design. Measuring one storey and 12,917 sq. ft., the facility will offer much flexibility in terms of the number of people it will serve in the future. If the population drops, Bacon said, the plant can still run efficiently. If the population increases, there is room to add filtration capacity. Filtration The plant will treat outgoing water with membrane filtration, a process that forces the water through a filter with a very small pore size. The plant will also replace the aging, nearby water heating plant, whose components will be incorporated into the building design. Even though the province and feds are kicking in two-thirds of the required cash, the city must still come up with a sizable sum of $4.4 million. Last week, city council authorized the borrowing of the money from Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC). Municipal Administrator Mark Kolt said the city has received a letter from CMHC committing the Crown corporation to the loan. He said CMHC offers municipalities very favourable interest rates. The rates tend to fluctuate but presently sit at just 3.8 per cent. Already public fears have surfaced that the plant will exceed its estimated budget. But Kolt said the project "was budgeted with lots of contingencies." "...where there was a choice to put in a higher number or a lower number [for specific parts of the project], we tended to put in the higher number," he noted. Of course once the project goes to tender, there is no guarantee a contractor will be ready and willing to build for the allotted amount. However, Bacon said contractors have already shown a strong interest in the project, calling to ask when bids will be accepted. Even if the plant stays within budget, it will mean a boost to the city's operational expenditures. Bacon anticipates one or two new full-time positions will have to be added. "We're hoping to use as much of our existing staff as possible, but there will be jobs created because of this," he said. While there had been talk of some construction on the plant possibly getting underway in 2010, that never materialized. Preparatory work did take place, however, including the surveying of land, clearing of brush, and monitoring of groundwater levels due to the proximity of the creek. See "Water..." on pg 7 Continued from pg 1 Required The treatment plant is required to allow the city to meet the province's tightening guidelines for potable water quality. Presently, the water is not up to those standards. But does that make the water an urgent health hazard? Not according to Don Rocan, manager of Manitoba's Office of Drinking Water. "If there was a question as to the safety of that water quality at any time, an advisory would be put in place by the appropriate medical officer of health," Rocan told The Reminder previously. Rocan said the province monitors drinking water quality across Manitoba on a keen and ongoing basis. He said stricter water standards Flin Flon is not meeting are generally based on life-time exposures. "...what we're doing is seeking long-term protection of public health to reduce the risk to as low a level as possible," he said. Guidelines Manitoba municipalities were given until 2012 to comply with the guidelines, Rocan said, because it is not something that can happen overnight. He offered the analogy of a section of faulty roadway where a disproportionate number of accidents occur. Although it is a problem that must be fixed, planning, time and money are required. An independent study raised concerns about the adequacy of Flin Flon's current water treatment system, including its ability to limit trihalomethanes, or THMs, which can or may cause cancer in sufficient doses. The 156-page city-commissioned study disclosed that most drinking water samples available for testing were either "borderline or in excess" of the regulatory restriction on THMs. Despite insufficient data to produce an annual average for THMs, the study determines it is "logical to conclude" that the existing system "has difficulty meeting the required THM limit." The study also identified as "concerns" coliform and E. coli "as they are present in the source water in concentrations higher than their stated limits."
