The district has put a $120,000 cap on removing excess waste.
Council recently supported a resolution to allow the ongoing desludging of two settling lagoons at the wastewater treatment facility to continue. In addition, council supported a resolution capping related additional expenses at $120,000, excluding GST.
The desludging is part of the expansion project for the waste treatment facility. What’s happened, explained interim administrator Tim Palmer, is that the contractor doing the work has found significantly more sludge than anticipated.
“The good news is the original quote was substantially less than the budgeted amount,” said Palmer ($100,000 had been budgeted but the quote came in at $43,000). “The bad news is we’ve got additional sludge we need to deal with.”
Palmer added delaying the desludging would cost the district a whole lot more.
“The recommendation is we allow the contractor to continue with the desludging, for which we’ve negotiated a reduced rate…,” said Palmer.
One of the lagoons was used for trucked waste, where contractors would empty septic tanks. Coun. Jeff Mallmes noted he and Coun. Todd Kyllo visited the trucked waste pond, and the experience left an impression.
“The trucked waste dump station has not been cleaned in 25 years… it is an unsightly thing what they throw away in their septic systems,” said Mallmes.
