Water Conservation Urged for North Thompson:
The District of Barriere received notification from the Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations that a Level 3 drought rating has been announced for the North Thompson region. This calls for an overall voluntary water use reduction of 30% for municipal, agricultural and industrial water users. Fortunately Barriere already has community-wide water use restrictions in place for watering/irrigating using our municipal deep well sources which achieves at least an initial 10% reduction. In addition, the district will reduce its irrigation in public spaces to achieve a further 20% reduction over this drought period. Residents and business owners are encouraged to follow suit and also to remember to turn off their irrigation during any power outage so as not to drain our water reservoir unnecessarily during the outage.
New Water Tanker for the Fire Department:
Council unanimously approved a new water tanker truck for the Barriere Volunteer Fire Department. The money for the $132,000 truck will come from district Fire Department reserves and the cost will be shared with the TNRD, as the Barriere Fire Protection area extends as far south as Louis Creek and Glengrove on Agate Bay Road, as well as north along Highway 5 to around McDougall Road.
Communities in Bloom:
The mayor thanked the community for everyone’s efforts in making this year’s Communities in Bloom event a huge success. On July 19 the Communities in Bloom judges arrived and with the help of many people a very successful barbecue was held in Fadear Park. The Thompson Valley Players youth provided some very impressive entertainment and many of the volunteer organizations set up displays to highlight what they provided to the community. Mayor Smith and committee member Barb McManus toured the judges around the district. The judges were very pleasant and very enthusiastic about the community, although residents will not know the results of their visit until September. But regardless of the results, the mayor says she believes the judges were truly impressed.
Biomass Boiler Presentation:
Steve Bearss from Fink Machine Inc. gave a comprehensive presentation to the Committee of the Whole on Aug. 10, regarding the biomass boiler system that will be installed at the new wastewater plant as its main heat source. Three new members of council had not had the opportunity to hear the original presentation made by Fink in 2013. Fink’s headquarters and service providers are located in Enderby where they stock a full range of replacement parts for their equipment. The Barriere boiler will be housed on the north side of the plant in a 40’ container along with the plant’s backup generator.
Solar Aquatics Wastewater Plant:
An updated completion schedule was presented to council at the Committee of the Whole by Kim Rink from EcoTek, the company that designed and is building the new Solar Aquatics wastewater plant behind the Fire Hall. Frustrations over the length of time it is taking to complete the building were expressed and Mr. Rink has agreed to come back to council with a target completion date, so that those connecting to the system would have a better timeline to work with.
Collection System:
Dave Underwood from True Consulting, the Engineer of Record for the wastewater project, gave council an update on the status of the collection system installation. A basic gravel road bed has been constructed on Railway Avenue that now provides a backage road link from Lilley to Newberry. Pressure testing on all the pipe has been successfully completed and only a small amount of video for the Railway section has yet to be reviewed by True. Work is underway on boulevard restoration and weekly meetings with LNB will continue until final completion of the project.
New RCMP Detachment Commander:
Corporal Steve Mancini attended council on August 10 in order to formally introduce himself. He and his family have relocated to Barriere from Manitoba.
Barriere Bandshell Upcoming Events:
• Friday, Aug. 14 - Jeremy Willis (7-8pm) and The Caves (8-9pm)
• Friday, Aug. 21 – Jackie Peters (6:30pm), Wolfchild (7-8pm), Gordie West (8-9pm)
• Friday, Aug. 28 – Dr. Recommended (7-9pm)