The constant that allows municipalities and cities to keep running during and after an election is that the professionals that do the actual work of the local government remain in place even if the mayor and council change. It may be that the mayor and council provide direction but in truth the kudos for bringing those directions to fruition need to go to District staff.
Barriere was very fortunate that staff and our District engineer, Dave Underwood of TRUE engineering put together a successful grant application for an environmentally friendly water reclamation system. Originally this was termed to be the new sewer system then it was called the new waste water treatment system and now since we really are reclaiming the water from the process the newest term of water reclamation system will be used.
On Tuesday Aug. 7, at the Public Works meeting Mr. Underwood brought members of the committee and staff up to date on the progress of the collection system design and the septage receiving station. The Request For Quotes document relating to the purchase of the equipment to do the septage collection was reviewed and will be posted next week. The lead time for this specially equipment can be a number of months so it is imperative that we start the process as quickly as possible.
The septage receiving building design was also reviewed and the process for tendering given the green light. The building will be of the precast concrete type. This will preclude any moisture problems and make construction very quick. Fortunately the site chosen requires little in the way of earthworks, water is close as is the required power. Mr. Underwood visited existing receiving plants and has used the best ideas from each to design for us a building that will have as few problems as is possible.
Mr. Kim Rink from EcoTek brought the committee up to speed on the design of the water reclamation plant. Various new technologies will be employed in the design and building of the plant. The capture and retention of heat is a primary concern since the fluids arriving at the plant will need to be warmed for optimal processing to occur. The green house portion of the plant will need to be insulted while still letting the most light in as possible. To achieve this the use of a layer of bubbles generated when insulation is needed and trapped between the layers of the clear material that form the roof and sides of the green house is being explored. In order to avoid the use of any additional chemicals such as those used as flocculants in conventional gravity separation tanks self cleaning micro filters may be employed.
Awhile ago our School District Trustee Ms. Rhonda Kershaw came forward with an idea to integrate a learning component into the water reclamation plant and system. Ms. Kershaw organized a meeting with representatives from SD#73, TRU, EcoTek, True engineering and I. From this initial discussion an effort has been made to design the building and system so that going forward students from various levels and disciplines can take advantage of the possibility of being a part of creating what is a cutting edge technology. Thanks Ms. Kershaw for your forward thinking efforts and dedication to the advancement of education and research.
District staff is working hard to put together a display for the Fall Fair of not only the progress on the water reclamation project but also on the upcoming zoning amendments process. To be honest zoning reviews can be really, really boring. They need to be done though and after four years the time had come to tackle the problem. We hired Ms. Sandra Upson to help with the process. In addition to helping run the public roundtable discussions and completing a multitude of other related tasks. Sandy has done a wonderful job in creating a presentation around the changes that are being formulated that is informative and will hold your interest. I urge you to stop by the District of Barriere Booth at the Fall Fair and take a look.
Bandshell Fridays will wrap up soon. Please take the time to at least stop by and say thanks to Councillor Sabyan and her dedicated team of volunteers.
Thanks to everyone for your feedback and comments. Everyone has a right to their opinion and good ideas spring sometimes from the oddest sources.