Vernon's mayor admits it could cause a lot of controversy, but he supports having different water restrictions based on the source. Wayne Lippert says it makes no sense for customers on the well-supplied Kalamalka Lake system, to be under the same rules as Duteau Creek. "My view on it is, it's one utility but you have number of different sources, not just Kal Lake and the Uplands reservoirs, you also have Antwerp Springs, like well number 2 that's been giving the okay to come back on line, so that's like saying. 'we have one well that's overflowing with water, but because the other one's dry and we're waiting for it to fill, then we shouldn't use the one that's full. That doesn't make sense to me."
Lippert says the tighter restrictions have a big financial cost to the regional district. "Our finance officer determined if we kept this (stage 3 rules) on for a significant length of time, it would cost us $1.5 million in revenue to the utility. My question back to the users and fellow directors is, how fair do you think it is to have to increase everybody's rates next year to make up that $1.5 million dollars? I think people would be very upset with us. It's not just managing water, it's manging finances as well."
The District of Coldstream is recommending NORD implement the same restrictions, regardless of source. Lippert made his comments following a NORD meeting where the stage 3 rules were put on hold for two weeks pending further evaluation of the water supply.
3 comments:
So it's all about the money now, is it? Funny, it started out as helping business owners, who would be adversely affected. I guess the spin is on, eh?
Wayne Lippert and his pretzel logic...what is he talking about? The source is not the reservoirs, the source is precipitation..water in the valley must be managed on a watershed basis, not on an individual reservoir basis.
Its about time! There is absolutely no reason for Kal to be on restrictions right now. There are a lot of businesses that will be hurting this summer due to the restrictions, and at least having a good percentage of our customers able to water this summer will allow us to maintain our staff.
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