City swimming in grant money as provincial, federal water and wastewater funding comes in
By Timothy Schafer
The city was the benefactor of nearly $3.5 million in federal and provincial grant money recently as it was successful in its two applications for the Clean Water and Wastewater Fund.
The city will receive $3,416,300 for two grant applications in its latest funding cycle, including $88,000 of a $95,000 total cost for a sewer phasing plan, and $3,328,300 of a $4,010,000 total cost for the wastewater treatment facility (WWTF) upgrades.
The federal government is funding 50 per cent of the project cost, while the province is in for 33 per cent while the City of Grand Forks is on the hook for the remaining 17 per cent.
The two projects were in the city’s 20 Year Capital Plan in various phases, said City of Grand Forks communications officer Cavan Gates in a press release.
“The grants accelerate the timeline and save the city money it was otherwise scheduled to spend,” he said.
The wastewater project has a total budget of $4.01 million, while the city will be contributing $682,000 from its reserves to pay for its share of the upgrade.
The wastewater project includes improving plant processing capacity and implementing a sludge dewatering system through the addition of a new bio-reactor, a centrifuge dewatering facility, and some changes to the existing lagoons, Gates noted.
The project will also improve regulatory compliance and safeguard the receiving waters (Kettle River).
The treatment plant would include the installation of a new mixing reactor and splitting to two trains to provide redundancy in the system, as well as increasing capacity for future growth and ensuring the plant does not exceed permitted flows.
“De-sludging is immediately required to enable current and future capacity in the lagoon system,” read a city staff report to council.
Energy optimization and improvements to the aerators will pay themselves off in several years and will also be eligible for FortisBC rebates if accomplished in the next two years.
The wastewater treatment plant upgrades in the Grand Forks capital plan are scheduled to begin this year, with completion slated for 2024.
The sewer phasing study will identify the costs, phases and timing for servicing the remainder of the community with a sewer system, said Gates, with the city contributing $17,000 from reserves to the project.
“Because not every residence is connected to the sanitary sewer system, the city has looked at servicing all parcels on a phased basis,” he said.
The sewer system currently services the majority of parcels on the north side of the Kettle River and the North Ruckles area.
The sewer phasing plan will examine options and priorities for future sewer system expansion into unserviced areas of the community, such as the west end of the city, the airport area, Donaldson Drive, South Ruckle, Johnson’s Flats and east of the Kettle River adjacent to highway 3, read a city staff report to council.
“An additional aspect of this study will be to identify options for septage (septic tank sludge) receiving and processing and future composting of biosolids resulting from the wastewater treatment plant upgrades,” the report stated.
Increased industrial and commercial development would be realized with the sewer extension, while groundwater and drinking water supplies would be protected from aging and failing septic systems.
The fund is a $2-billion federal program for the rehabilitation of water treatment and distribution infrastructure and wastewater treatment infrastructure, collection and conveyance infrastructure. The municipal contribution is only 17 per cent of the total project budget.
The city has also applied for the construction of well number two (well 2A) under the New Building Canada fund — Small Communities Fund (SCF) in March, 2016, and city staff advised against bumping the wastewater treatment plant application in favour of the well construction, as council had preferred.