With final sign-offs for the Church Road/Elphinstone Well Field project inked in the late afternoon of July 6, the Sunshine Coast Regional District (SCRD) met its promise to have that facility ready before the Chapman Water System moved into Stage 2 water restrictions.
Elevated rules on outdoor water use, including a ban on lawn watering, are in force for that and the Eastbourne system as of noon on July 7.
Project completion sign-off
As the July 6 special board meeting concluded with a public/media question period at about 5 p.m., chief administrative officer Dean McKinley did a quick check with staff outside the meeting room. With that, he confirmed that the project’s primary contractor, Maycon Industries, had endorsed the project’s “substantial completion” documents. He noted that to his knowledge when he delivered a water supply projects update just over an hour earlier, only the regional district had signed off.
“That’s great news," board chair Leonard Lee responded. A cheer of approval came from the meeting room public gallery.
Contracting for creek monitoring
Another required action to be able to pump water from the well field, an arrangement for flow monitoring of Soames Creek, was endorsed by the board as the final item of meeting business.
ISL Engineering and Land Services has been selected to do two years of compliance monitoring and reporting to the Ministry of Forests, as required under the SCRD’s water licence for the well field. The contract for that work is valued at $250,000, which includes a 25 per cent contingency allowance. ISL’s bid was the lowest of three received after the SCRD issued a request for tenders for the work in June 2023.
According to a staff report presented at the meeting, the work will commence in early July. The report also noted that while the award value is within the 2023 budget allowance for the project, "it is recommended that the 2024 [water] user fees be amended to reflect the change in funding needs” for the contract. Discussions on user fee levels are to be included in the coming year's budget planning sessions, which are slated for the fall of 2023.
McKinley told the board that contracting was necessary as the regional district currently does not have “the horsepower” within existing staff resources to undertake the work. He also clarified that even though the monitoring is being done at the request of the province, the work is considered operational, and therefore not eligible for any current senior government grant opportunities.
