$1.00 + HST Vol. 27 | No. 7 Thursday, March 31, 2011
Surrounded by family and friends, Simon and Jemima Schooner (front centre) celebrated their 65th wedding anniversary on March 26, 2011. The couple were married in Bella Coola in 1946. See story on page three .
Hagensborg Water District struggles with funding, capital development demands BY CAITLIN THOMPSON The Hagensborg Water District continues its struggle to fund the numerous projects that are well beyond the scope of the District’s tax base. Most pressing is meeting the province’s requirement that all drinking water be treated so that it is considered ‘potable,’ a law that
has been in effect since the mid 1990s. Despite drinking untreated water locally for decades, this Drinking Water Protection Act is sweeping in character and provides no exemptions. Anxious to avoid chlorine, the District sought an innovative solution in the form of a Point of Entry UV treatment plan. While this may provide the answer to one problem,
there are still several hurdles the project faces before it gets off the ground. Although the POE project has the support of Vancouver Coastal Health, it requires the formation of a policy to approve it and a pilot project to test the system before full installation can take place. This required more money, and water users saw their rates rise sharply to fund
the project as they wished to avoid unnecessary debt with the province. The District committed to seeking grant funding to cover the additional costs, bearing in mind that being an Improvement District drastically reduced their scope of available funding. On top of the POE project, the District’s aging infrastructure is badly in need of repair.
Replacing the primary watermain, an aging fire truck, and rebuilding the dam intake have pushed costs into the millions. As of press time replacement of the aging watermain is projected to cost $2,840, 000 and the price for the purification process is now estimated at $1,575,000. To SEE WATER ON PAGE 3