CARSTAIRS - The Town of Carstairs has been successful in a grant application to help fund the municipality’s new reservoir and pump station, which are expected to be constructed starting within the next 24 months.
The $2,646,759 grant comes from the Alberta Municipal Water/Wastewater Partnership, representing 49.53 per cent of the estimated project cost.
In a letter received and reviewed by council at last week’s meeting, Minister of Transportation and Economic Corridors Devin Dreeshen said the final grant amount is based on the actual eligible costs at the time of the project completion, up to the maximum grant amount.
“With this funding, the Town of Carstairs will be solely responsible for all costs to use, operate, maintain, repair and replace the complete project,” said Dreeshen.
The town's chief administrative officer Rick Blair said planning for reservoir and pump station project has been in the work for some time.
“Our intention is to build that on the east side of Carstairs because of the high growth in the area that we have under consideration,” said Blair.
The reservoir will be 3,000 cubic metres in size, as well as the pump station.
The original design for the project is now about four years old, so the town will be revisiting those plans, he said.
“We are going to have that re-looked at by the engineers, but I would hope within the next 24 months we would be starting that (construction),” he said.
Asked if the town will have to come up with the remainder of the funding, he said, “There will be some participation by the town. There will be some participation by the developers. We do have some off-site levy monies that will assist in that also. And some will be debenture.”
Council received Dreeshen’s letter as information.
