Wallaceburg will learn what the preferred option is regarding their water source on Thursday, February 18.
A public meeting is being held from 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at the UAW Hall in Wallaceburg. A presentation will start at 7 p.m.
Wallaceburg Coun. Jeff Wesley, who also serves on the PUC, a board told the Sydenham Current he wants to see a good crowd in attendance.
“Whether the results are positive or negative, the members of the Chatham-Kent PUC have to see that the community of Wallaceburg cares,” he said. “This could lead to the decision the community wants. This is important for our community.”
Environmental assessment recommended
The Water and Wastewater Master Plan for the Municipality of Chatham-Kent, completed by Dillon Consulting Ltd. in 2012, recommended a Municipal Class Environmental Assessment to determine and assess the water supply source options for Wallaceburg and area.
Stantec Consulting was hired to conduct the assessment and they have presented four potential options, which includes rehabilitating the current Wallaceburg Water Treatment Plant.
Stantec’s “preferred alternative” is to connect to the Chatham water supply, which gets its water from Lake Erie.
Evaluation committee
After three public meetings were held, an evaluation committee met on December 8 to review the project scope and to compile a score for the different alternatives.
The committee met again on January 14 to review the scoring of the matrix and discuss outcomes and comments from the group.
“The evaluation committee, that was made up of eight people, spent a lot of time evaluating every option and performing a detailed rating on each,” Wesley said.
“The results of that evaluation will be shared with the public at the meeting on Thursday. As a result of the work of the evaluation committee, there is a preferred option.”
Wesley added: “This is an important meeting – the public needs to find out the results of the evaluation committee and either support or not support the results of the evaluation. The members of the Chatham-Kent PUC will be in attendance and they also need to hear what the community has to say. I will be sharing my comments at the public meeting as well.”
PUC will make the final decision
Other members of the PUC have told the Sydenham Current that they will keep an open mind about the decision about Wallaceburg’s water, including Mayor Randy Hope.
“I need to look at some cost analysis and some numbers,” Hope said back in July.
“I am going to be a fair as I am to any other community. I will look at what makes long term sense. There might be some people that may not like where the water is coming from but the reality is that we are reducing the debt level of the PUC. We are keeping water prices low, with the lowest in the area. I am keeping very open minded but again, but again I listen to everybody.”
PUC member and South Kent Coun. Trevor Thompson said he believes this will be the hardest decision to make during this term of council.
“To me this is the hardest thing we will struggle with over the next four years,” Thompson told the Sydenham Current back in June. “That is council, that is PUC, that is anything. I think this is the biggest issue facing Chatham-Kent right now and it is a Chatham-Kent issue and I take all of that into consideration.”
He added: “The needs and wants of Wallaceburg are obviously at the forefront, but also it is important the needs of every single water user in the Municipality.”
PUC member and Chatham Coun. Brock McGregor said he believes it will be a difficult decision as well.
“A big part of finding that balance is being involved throughout the process,” McGregor said in June.
“To think that you can make an informed unbiased decision just sitting down and reading reports or reading a summary of output, isn’t really realistic. I think a big part of finding that balance is being informed at every step of the process and really seeing how the process takes shape, how the process changes as we go along.”
McGregor added: “I think that the decision really becomes a culmination of all that work together which at the end of the day, it’s still going to be a difficult decision but I think in having some confidence in making that decision you need to be involved right from day one, until the day the report hits the table and we have to vote.”
Financial run-down
Stantec has outlined the financial impact of each alternative, with upgrading the Wallaceburg Treatment Plant costing approximately $3.4 million in the short term for capital costs to rehabilitate the existing facility. However, Stantec said staying with the Wallaceburg option, the long-term forecast of 40 years would see it costing upwards to $67.2 million.
Stantec’s preferred option of connecting to the Chatham drinking water system would cost more in the short term for capital cost, approximately $11.9 million to $20.3 million, depending on which of the four design solutions are chosen. The projected 40-year financial outlook ranges from $37.5 million to $41.2 million.
‘No Lake Erie water’
Many people in the community have expressed their concerns about Stantec’s “preferred alternative.”
An online petition was launched, calling for “no Lake Erie water“, and various organizations expressed their displeasure with connecting to Chatham’s system.
“We feel the water in Wallaceburg is excellent quality,” said Kris Lee, a member of the Wallaceburg Advisory Team for a Cleaner Habitat (WATCH) group and a member of the evaluation committee, back in September.
“The spills have gone down in terms of the industry upstream. The only thing that we need right now is something more definitive from the industry to know exactly what measures they have in place to prevent the spills.”
Karen Debergh, president of the Wallaceburg and District Chamber of Commerce, said rehabilitating the existing Wallaceburg Water Treatment Plant should be the way to go.
“In the short run, rehabilitating the existing building is a far less cost to the taxpayer, so many other factors can come into play over the next 40 years, it is hard to validate the future costs that were presented to us,” Debergh said in December 2014.
Lambton-Kent-Middlesex MP Bev Shipley also penned a letter to the Sydenham Current last May, in support of rehabilitating the Wallaceburg water plant.
“I’ve also received interventions from municipal leaders and environmental organizations with more than 30 years of experience with respect to water supply options in Wallaceburg,” Shipley wrote. “Without exception they are opposed to the recommended option to connect to the Chatham Water Supply option. Equally they are unanimous in their support for Option Two, an upgrade to the existing Wallaceburg Water Treatment Plant.”
Next steps
The Chenal Ecarte provides raw water for the Wallaceburg Water Treatment Plant which then provides municipal water to the community of Wallaceburg and surrounding area.
The Wallaceburg Water Treatment Plant was constructed in 1946 and has undergone major upgrades in 1948, 1980 and 2009.
Today, much of the existing infrastructure is aging and the plant equipment requires upgrades.
Prior to the public meeting on Thursday, a regular PUC meeting will be held where PUC staff will present a preferred solution. Finally, on March 2 a special PUC meeting has been scheduled where the board will vote on the recommendation made by PUC staff.
